Split (1)

train · 8.01M rows

text stringlengths 316 100k
(Kalamazoo, MI) – Here’s the response from Bell’s Brewery. To all interested: Yesterday, Northern Brewer posted on their Facebook page about a cease and desist letter that they received from Bell’s Brewery, Inc. I apologize that Bell’s has taken so long to respond to this issue, but all members of management were travelling to the Craft Brewers Conference yesterday and could not get a response posted. On March 18, 2011, representatives of Bell’s Brewery, Inc. sent a letter to Northern Brewer regarding that company’s use of Three Hearted Ale for a homebrewing kit. This letter was sent out at a time when Bell’s is having to defend it’s trademarks(including Two Hearted) on several fronts. Because we are finding ourselves in this situation, we believe that is necessary to correspond in writing to those we feel are infringing on our marks. We do not know the owners of Northern Brewer nor were we familiar with the products they offered until recently. From a legal perspective a phone call was not going to provide the documented defense that we need as we try to defend this trademark now and in the future. Here is a partial extract of the letter we sent: “As a result of the extensive business investment by Bell’s Brewery, significant goodwill has inured in the TWO HEARTED trademark.” “While Bell’s Brewery encourage the development of independent brewers and homebrewing, Bell’s Brewery are concerned with your use of THREE HEARTED ALE Extract kit.” “Bell’s Brewery are of the opinion that there is a likelihood of confusion between your mark and the trademarks for TWO HEARTED owned by Bell’s Brewery. The marks create the same overall commercial impression. Furthermore, the goods associated with your mark and the trademark for Two Hearted are identical.” “Consequently, your use of THREE HEARTED is likely to create confusion, deception, or mistake among purchasers as to the origin or source of the goods/services, or convey to the purchasing public that the goods/services are approved by Bell’s Brewery or that there is an affiliation or connection between you and Bell’s Brewery.” We have no issue with Northern Brewer other than this trademark infringement. We are flattered that they want to clone our beer-we have no problem with that. In fact, our staff recently agreed to work with Zymurgy magazine on a Two Hearted clone. Clones are not the issue. Neither do we have a problem with homebrewers. Bell’s was founded as a homebrew shop in 1983 and has been in that business ever since. We are great supporters of the homebrew community and have underwritten many competitions, donated prizes to clubs, conducted tours with homebrew clubs, provided beer for certain AHA conventions, spoken at AHA convention, held an AHA membership rally, etc. etc. We have no problem with homebrewing or homebrewers. We love homebrewers. Bell’s has worked long and hard to develop and market Two Hearted Ale. It is a very valuable asset for our company. As president of Bell’s it is my job to protect those types of assets. That is my responsibility to my employees and their families, and to the shareholders of the company. Never were we contacted by Northern Brewer asking permission to use Three Hearted. Upon learning of Three Hearted we moved to defend an asset that we own and have owned for many years. This is our right and duty. A trademark that is not defended becomes worthless. And while some of you may think that this was harmless flattery, by not defending against this we would be opening the door for further challenges against our mark. At this time it would appear that Northern Brewer plans to respect and acknowledge our right to this trademark, as I understand that they are renaming their product. For this, we thank them. This is all we are asking for. As regards Third Street, we filed for an extension to oppose, not an opposition. The use of the extension is often used so that two companies can sit down and see what each others marks are, and if they can co-exist. Often an agreement is drawn up between the two companies for this co-existence. We are currently in that discovery phase with Third Street. I know many of you think that Bell’s was heavy handed in our actions. I’m sorry you feel this way. Bell’s has been on both sides of trademark issues-sometimes a winner and sometimes a loser. Twice in the history of Two Hearted we have been sent cease and desist letters regarding the labels. Additionally, we acquired the label by written permission of it’s former owner who gave it up many years ago. When these actions arise we try to respect others intellectual property and conduct ourselves with a modicum of decency. Trademark law is part of being in the consumer products business. I hope this letter explains our position and that you will understand that we are just trying to protect what is ours. We are sorry if some of you feel offended by our action, but for us we felt it was the most professional and legally necessary means to an end. We hold no malice towards Northern Brewer, their employees or their customers. Sincerely, Larry J. Bell President Bell’s Brewery, Inc.
City streets are microcosms of the neighbourhoods they serve. Their function and configuration must adapt to evolving built form and circulation patterns. With new developments and businesses cropping up along Jasper Avenue, the nature of the way people use the street is changing. It's historically been positioned as a high-volume arterial road, with little regard to the priorities of pedestrians and cyclists. But with the population of Oliver expected to increase by 10,000 in the next two to three decades, that's about to change. Jasper Avenue from above, image retrieved from Google Maps Edmonton's 'Imagine Jasper' drives the busy avenue towards a new destination, one that aims to greatly enhance the pedestrian experience. The project began in November 2015, and since then, a number of open houses have gauged public opinion regarding the future vision of this key corridor. The target area of redevelopment stretches from 109 Street to 124 Street, with reconstruction of Jasper Avenue expected to begin in 2019. With that timeline in mind, the City of Edmonton has developed draft design options for public view and comment. The City thinks Jasper Avenue is due for change, image retrieved from Google Street View The proposed redesign would rid the image of Jasper Avenue as a drab arterial road with narrow sidewalks and little landscaping, replacing it with a main street that expands pedestrian space and increases the safety of every road user. The scheme incorporates more trees, pedestrian lighting, and street furniture, with wider sidewalks making it all possible. The plan would maintain four travel lanes and left turn lanes from 118 to 109 Street. The enhanced pedestrian amenities — including "flex spaces" that accommodate season-specific programming like sidewalk cafes and food trucks — would require the removal of an existing parking and bus lane. Existing street conditions, image via City of Edmonton The draft plan also calls for full traffic lights at every intersection. Probably the most fascinating part of this system is the pedestrian prioritization of the signals. The lights will be coordinated at rush hour according to the average walking speed of a pedestrian — ensuring that someone travelling between 109 Street to 124 Street would be greeted by green lights the whole way. The timing also corresponds to the average travelling distance of a vehicle, which if maintaining a speed of approximately 38 kilometres per hour, would not approach any red lights. The speed limit will remain at 50 kilometres an hour, but the new infrastructure will be designed to encourage slower travel. Proposed changes for Jasper include flex spaces, image via City of Edmonton The proposed elimination of the parking lane will likely draw the ire of motorists and some businesses, while the lack of a bike lane won't win any favours with the frequently disenfranchised cycling community. The plan does however implement improved cycle connections across Jasper at 110 and 121 Streets. The discourse around the proposals will elicit a range of responses until next spring, when City Council will consider the final plan and budget. In the meantime, the City is inviting you to have your say in an online survey that will remain open until December 14. Proposed features emphasize the pedestrian experience, image via City of Edmonton To learn more about Imagine Jasper, visit our Forum thread or the official project webpage.
A group of Zellers pharmacists will seek an injunction Thursday to prevent the retailer from selling thousands of patient records to two major grocery store chains for at least $35 million, says their lawyer, Gerhard Pyper. The application comes amid a lawsuit being heard in Ontario Superior Court of Justice (Commercial List). The pharmacists allege Zellers has no right to the records and the sale violates privacy laws, according to court documents. Zellers is countersuing the pharmacists, saying its licensing agreement gives it ownership of the files and the right to sell them, the documents say. The retailer also claims the pharmacists are interfering with its ability to transfer those files to Loblaw Companies Ltd. and Metro Inc. The pharmacies are closing as part of Zellers’ deal with U.S. retail giant Target Corp., which will open stores in 135 former Zellers locations starting in 2013. As part of the $1.825 billion deal, Target had the option to buy the records. It chose not to and will open pharmacies run by franchisees. Zellers agreed to sell the records at 95 stores to Loblaw for about $35 million and at seven others to Metro for an undisclosed amount. Nine Zellers pharmacists are now suing for $3 million each for breach of contract. But pharmacist Prabhjot Dhanoa, who has owned the pharmacy in the Shoppers World Brampton Zellers for 20 years, says it’s not about the money. “My patients are going to suffer. A lot are seniors. They’ve dealt with me for the last 20 years. ... I could have opened something in the area ... and taken my files with me. These files don’t belong to me or anybody. They’re patient files.” Zellers claims the pharmacists are interfering with the sale by removing signs advising patients their records are being transferred, according to court filings. Until the stores close, the records will remain with Zellers. Patients do not have to deal with the stores that bought their files.
A concept render created by Martin Hajek (not affiliated with Apple) Martin Hajek Apple's successor to the iPad Air will come in a gold color option just like its line of iPhones, according to Bloomberg, which says it spoke with people familiar with the company's plans. The company will offer this new gold color option in addition to the existing silver and grey options available for the iPad Air. This isn't the first time we've heard that Apple will add a gold variant to the iPad lineup. In early September, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, who has a pretty solid track record when it comes to predict Apple product launches, also reported the company would release a gold iPad. Bloomberg's report doesn't mention whether or not Apple will offer the same color option for the iPad Mini. Last year, Apple unveiled the iPad Air and iPad mini with Retina display in October, so if Apple keeps with the same launch cycle we could be seeing new iPads this month. Other than a gold color option, the second-generation iPad Air is expected to feature a Touch ID home button, a new processor made by Apple (probably called the A8X), and 2GB of memory. At the same time, Apple is rumored to be working on a giant 12.9-inch iPad, but don't expect to see it until next year.
So I love to write. I write a lot, scenarios or books, dialogues for games or things like that. One of the writer that amaze me the most is Guillermo Del Toro. He is best known for his scenarios of movies and some movies he realized entirely, but has done so much more. The way he use fantasy and things related to it in a very dark fashion without being too grim or depressive is just perfect to me. Sooo, my wonderful secret santa had the really good idea to buy me his book ! And not just any book, the one in which he describes his thought process while creating and where he shows exactly what goes through his mind ! It is the most motivating book I've read in AGES ! And I've been wanting it for sooo long ! So, a thousand thank you to my secret santa, and thank you for telling me a little more about yourself too, I really appreciated it : )
“The Tortoise begins to play: B-A-C- – but as he bows the final H, suddenly, without warning, a shattering sound rudely interrupts his performance. Both he and Achilles spin around, just in time to catch a glimpse of myriad fragments of glass tinkling to the floor from the shelf where Goblet G had stood, only moments before. And then … dead silence.” Douglas R. Hofstadter Gödel, Escher, Bach The Dark Lord had won. Hogwarts Castle June 13, 1992. 20:43:24 The Stone instantiated in Lord Voldemort’s hand, glistening coldly in the reflected light of the mirror, free from any imperfection. A quick flick of the wrist. A swift twitch of the finger. A deafening crash of a pistol firing. Harry’s eyes barely had a chance to widen before the bullet entered his forehead. The Boy Who Lived was dead. The entirety of his being; his mind, unprotected by Horcrux or ritual or saved state, was currently settling onto the ground, a red mist of gore, bone, and brain. The remainder was stuck to the walls behind the Mirror, (the Mirror itself being perfectly unblemished), or still clung desperately to the inside of his ruined skull. The chamber still echoed with the discharge of the weapon, but Lord Voldemort was already gone, willing to take no chances with what might happen upon the Boy’s death. Sagittarius A* Now, Before, Later Dumbledore emerged from the tunnel. His world was all worlds. His world was fire. His world was void. His world was formless nothing. His world was stagnant death. He focused all his being onto the two worlds that mattered. In one, the star burned, rendering the world insane, its very soul raging with white plasma that rendered such abstract notions as space and time irrelevant in the face of the heat. He looked across the span of eons into the other world, wherein the Boy Who Lived was dead. He had all of eternity to rehearse the ritual, and yet, he still felt the slightest bit of nervousness. He began, using the Line of Merlin to harness the magic of all worlds into this one final act. He was Dumbledore, destroyer of worlds, creactor of life. Everything that ever was and everything that ever will be in the universe had led him to this moment. This moment that must come to pass because it already has. All worlds had narrowed to two, and from those two all worlds would be born. When the Line of Merlin could bear the strain no longer, it glowed white, and began to fray apart at the edges. Dumbledore could feel the eyes of prophecy in the heavens upon him, about to be torn apart by the ritual of Harry’s creation. The Headmaster connected the nodes in his mind, and it was done. Sagitarrius A* collapsed in less than a second. It folded in upon itself, and distorting the very fabric of reality as it did so. In the final moments of its life, the Headmaster flitted through some dimension that only exists in the minds of addled physics professors, and emerged to the place Beyond Time, where he was connected by the power of the ritual. In the world he left behind, a galaxy was born. A galaxy where the balance of the world was held in place by a single thread of time, a universe where the only means by which the Crux could succeed was to seek the path of the Scorpion and the Archer. The fires of prophecy would burn with the white light of truth; they had come to be because they had come to be. He entered a world that was already born, a world where the balance of the world was held in place by a single thread of time that had, until now, been snipped. It was at this very moment that he emerged. He was outside the Mirror. No, he was inside? It was a curious sensation, experiencing time backwards. He took a brief moment to consider the runes that had once been incomprehensible to him. He smiled. Inside and outside the Mirror, the world was hazy, a confounded miasma of abstraction, like some sort of halfway lucid dream that someone had pressed the rewind button on. His brother took the stone from him. Not from him. From his shadowform. It was not him? He was talking to his brother. But it wasn’t him. He was saying the war was over. They had won. That was true, no? It was Time. Time to stop holding on to the stone. Give away the stone. Yes. You could change the past, you just had to think about it at the right time. As he moved further backwards in time, he considered the tools of his craft that he still had upon his person. The Line of Merlin. The Stone of Permanence. The Elder Wand. A curious glass bottle. A curious glass bottle of viscous black ichor. Mid-Fall, 1998 Wilbraham, Massachusetts “Everett, was that you?” Sarah Snipes was cleaning dishes in the kitchen when she heard the crack. Or was it a pop? It was probably just her husband playing around in his lab. He was a compounding pharmacist, and owned his own store, so he often experimented with different formulations of various creams or pastes to sell. As it were, Everett Snipes was not in his laboratory. Rather, he was in his study. “Yes, dear. One of my vials popped a cork,” he yelled a blatant lie back to her. “Okay, well make sure to clean it up before you let Lily in there. She’s at that age, you know?” As if on cue, Lily burst in through the study door, her hair all fire and curls, her eyes an angry emerald-green. She had all the energy of a five-year old, and all of the precociousness as well. She stared at her dad who was sitting on the Comfy Chair, and the strange man sitting on the Chair That Mom Yells At Me When I Climb On. “Hi Daddy. Hi Mister Man. Guess what? I learned what a Quine was today in school. I bet you don’t know what a Quine is, Mister Man.” She glared at the stranger. He considered for a moment, then replied, “If I did not, then this statement would be a lie.” She paused, thought for a moment, then giggled. “You’re funny, Mister Man. But you’ve got a girl’s hair.” At this, he self consciously adjusted his ponytail. To break the ensuing silence, he reached over and grabbed the thick glass bottle filled with viscous black ichor, and placed it into his suit pocket. It created an awkward lump in his figure. “I hope that you know, ah, ‘Everett’–” Lily cut in, “His name’s Daddy, you know!” “Well, I hope that you know, ‘Daddy’, that I truly understand the gravity of this intrusion. And I hope that you understand that my need is proportionate.” Everett nodded. The stranger spoke again, “I would tell you that what you have done today would honor my mother’s memory more than anything else you’ve done in your life. But,” he looked at Lily who had already grown bored, and was splayed out on the floor, playing idly with the rug. He smiled, widely, “I see that this is not true.” Everett smiled, genuinely. “Thank you.” “Besides, I have a gift for you in return. A bottle of my own magic that will hopefully aid you in your life’s quest,” at this, the stranger produced a plastic bottle from an extendable space within his robes, and handed it to Everett, who looked at the label. Head and Shoulders Everett laughed. “Drop dead.” Early Fall, 1998 The Tower Harry had informed the Shichinin that, especially considering to whom they were delivering the message, that they were to not under any circumstances, read its contents. Which of course, meant, especially considering to whom they were delivering the message, that they absolutely were going to be reading its contents. In fact, they didn’t even wait to leave the Tower before they ripped open the envelope. It had been quite some time since they had a good old fashioned, film noir-esque missing person search. And the person that they were looking for? Oh, this was going to be spectacular. Unfortunately, they were slightly underwhelmed (although a bit intrigued), at the contents of the message. “Bahl’s Stupefaction. 1 week.” King’s Cross Outside Time “No,” said Albus Dumbledore. “No, no, NO! ” The building sense of power rose to an unbearable peak, and then disappeared. And then, there was nothing. He lay facedown, listening to the silence. He was perfectly alone. Nobody else was there. A long time later, or maybe no time at all, it came to him that he must exist, must be more than disembodied thought, because he had a sense of touch, and the thing against which he lay existed too. He sat up. His body appeared unscathed. He touched his face. He was not wearing glasses anymore. His beard was gone. As were the wrinkles. Albus turned slowly on the spot, and his surroundings seemed to invent themselves before his eyes. A wide-open space, bright and clean. He was the only person there, except for– He recoiled. He spotted him sitting on a bench, idly reading a curiously thick book. Tom Riddle. He seemed thoroughly unconcerned with the situation. “He cannot hurt you.” He spun around. Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres was walking towards him, sprightly and upright, wearing sweeping robes over a Muggle suit. “Prophecy has proven true. I have come to rescue you, Headmaster.” “Harry. You have… You have aged. How long has it been?” “Oh, about 20,000 years, objectively. Subjectively? Well, for you, it’s been but a few seconds, has it not?” “It has, but I am trapped outside of Time. I would fear for you, but you are The Crux, the Once and Future King. You do not carry the look of sadness about you, which lightens my heart greatly. Dare I ask if you have succeeded? Did you tear apart the very stars in heaven to save its people?” “Ah… Well…. Not quite.” Harry tittered on his feet a bit, “In fact, we’re not really out of the woods just yet.” “I confess, I do not understand. But then again, that is more than fair turnabout. Would you do an old man the honor of explaining what I must do?” King’s Cross Later The Headmaster’s head was still reeling from the enormity of the plan. But, then again, it fit with all the prophecies. For the first time since Nicholas Flamel had bequeathed upon him the Words of the First Enchanter that unlocked the keys to the entire Web of Prophecy, things began to make sense. “We have a final pair of gifts to give you, that I suspect you will greatly need.” Harry removed from his robes a thin stone rod, “The Line of Merlin Unbroken.” Harry handed the Headmaster the wand with reverence. Tom Riddle stood up from the bench, put down his book, and strode forward. “And, Headmaster, my old enemy and future friend, I also have a gift for you.” He produced a thick glass bottle filled with viscous black ichor, and handed it to Dumbledore. Dumbledore understood. “Headmaster,” Harry spoke, “You need to understand something. You have a choice at this moment. All worlds, ultimately, have narrowed down to this one choice. Although I am, as you say, the Crux, you still must make this choice of your own volition. You would be sacrificing your Life, and your Time. Truly.” “Harry. You know my views on this matter. I have already sacrificed my Life and my Time once for your sake, for the sake of the world. Besides, you are the Boy Who Lived. I’m sure you’ll find a way to rescue me again.” He smiled with a twinkle in his eye. “Now, how do I leave this place?” “Oh yes,” Harry smiled at him. “We are in King’s Cross, are we not? I think that if you decided to move on, you would be able to… Let’s say.. Board a train.” “And where would it take me?” “Beyond.” said Harry simply. Silence again. “Goodbye, Headmaster. And thank you, truly.” “Do not pity the dead, Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres. Pity those who live without love.” And with that, he boarded a train, and disappeared into the tunnel. estlaC strawgoH 72:34:02 .2991, 13 enuJ The Boy Who Lived was dead. Harry’s eyes barely had a chance to widen before the bullet entered his forehead. A deafening crash of a pistol firing. A swift twitch of the finger. A quick flick of the wrist. The Stone instantiated in Lord Voldemort’s hand, glistening coldly in the reflected light of the mirror, covered in a viscous black ichor. The Dark Lord was laughing.
A delegation of Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, arrived Monday for talks with Iranian officials on repairing ties, local media reported. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Tasnim news agency said the team was led by Hamas political bureau member Mohammed Nasr and included Ossama Hamdan, who is in charge of international relations. The visit is aimed at clearing the way for a mission by Hamas chief Khaled Mashal, Amir Mousavi, the head of Tehran's Center of Strategic Research, said on the website of Hamas-linked Palestinian daily Al-Ressalah. The Syrian conflict has strained ties between Hamas and Iran, with the Palestinian faction breaking ties with Damascus while Tehran has remained a strong ally of the regime. Meshaal, in an interview with AFP in August, acknowledged differences over Syria but said their common enmity against Israel was a uniting factor. Iran is reported to provide equipment for Palestinian fighters of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, a smaller militant group in Gaza, to fire missiles at the Jewish state. The US reportedly told a panel of eight experts advising a UN Security Council Committee on Iran there was overwhelming evidence Tehran was continuing its transfers of weapons to its proxies an allies. Earlier this year, the Israeli Navy seized an Iranian shipment of rockets, mortars and other arms that was en route to Gaza via Sudan. Islamic Jihad chief Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, during a visit to Tehran in October, praised Iran for its role during the Gaza conflict. The 50-day war between Israel and militants in Gaza that ended on August 26 killed about 2,200 Palestinians, and 73 on the Israeli side, mostly soldiers.
VADODARA: Four persons including two BJP leaders were attacked by a mob of around 15 persons over a land dispute in Saiyed Vasna area on Wednesday.Kirti Patel, a resident of Atladra , has registered a complaint at Gotri police station. Patel said he along with councillor Kalpesh Patel and Mahisagar BJP president Jayprakash Patel had gone to Saiyed Vasna after being informed that a plot owned his sister-in-law was illegally occupied by some persons.Patel named one Anuj Patel in his complaint alleging that the persons who occupied the plot were his close aides. After talking to the people at the plot, Patel called up the police to get the land vacated.However, they were threatened and later thrashed by the mob with sharp-edged weapons and hockey sticks, he alleged. The BJP councillor is presently undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Manjalpur.
Desert Operations Free Items Giveaway 0 Keys Are Left Desert Operations Free Items Giveaway MMO Game: Desert Operations \| Area: Internacional \| Official Website: Desert Operations FINISHED More Giveaways Instructions:Gameitems and Looki Publishing GmbH publisher for Desert Operations - DO, collaboration with FreeMMORPGlist.Com MMOGratis.Com and GiochiMMO.it offer you Giveaway for new users registred with our link these FREE pack value 10 Euros.These codes will work until next 4th December 2016.Contains:2000 Northrop B2 Spirit1000 Queen Elizabeth Aircraft Carrier100 B-52 Stratofortress50 Factory300000 Kerosene1000000 AmmunitionsStep 1. Make sure you never miss a giveaway, follow us on Google+,Facebook and Twitter:Step 2. Complete the captcha, then add your email to the field above (beside the Get Your Key button) you can only sign up once for this giveaway. If is the first time you use our system please check your email to validate it and add again the same mail in the field above.Step 3. Create account Desert Operations and login in to your account.Step 4. Go to the shop and select Cupon then redeen the code.Step: Share with your Friends:About this game:Desert Operations is a free to play strategy MMO for Internet browsers in which players get to rule their own country and compete against other players. They must use diplomacy or fight in order to control the world.
There's a sign next to where they brew the tea at Teavana. It reads: Some call it steeping to perfection. We call it pre-boarding for your tea journey. I saw that and thought: funny. My mum calls it "mashing". Anyway, Teavana, America's first purpose-built tea bar, backed by Starbucks and newly opened on New York's Upper East Side, is reassuringly hilarious. I mean, it's rather nice, in its own way: soft lighting, warm colours, attentive staff pressing upon you free samples of that flavoured tea that tastes like a bit like hot Ribena. It has an extensive range, and some pretty-looking cakes. It's very clean. But it's just so crushingly pointless. It's a tea bar (it serves no coffee), but it acts more like a determinedly ambitious boutique hotel. You're welcomed at the front door by staff in uniform, presented with a menu card, encouraged to take in the surroundings. They – this is true – actually gift-wrapped my Chelsea bun. It's easy to mock – boy, is it easy to mock – but Teavana, with all its new-age, pseudo-spiritual bullshit, points to a wider trend: what you might call America's fetishisation of tea. Since when did tea become part of a marketable lifestyle? The questions in New York's cafés are always the same: black or green? Hold or cold? Kale or quinoa? Gay or straight? And once you've finished this back-and-forth, what do you end up with? A rather forlorn-looking cup of tepid water into which the bag has yet to be introduced. What Teavana tells us is: tea is now a drink for America's boujis. Construction workers and delivery men, stick to your Dunkin's coffee – your calloused hands and peanut brains probably can't handle something so chichi. We are tea drinkers, not barbarians: we're creative, alternative, organic, sustainable. We play the oboe in our spare time; we make our own hummus. We're caffeine-free, and we all went to Oberlin – and we're gonna make a big deal about ourselves. Well, I call foul. This is tea we're talking about! Delicious, refreshing, normal tea! With milk! In a china cup! There's really nothing better. Some of life's best bits come with a nice cup of tea attached: on the sofa watching the first morning of a Test match, with a cream scone in an English country garden, in a museum café when your parents come to visit. Tea accompanies life's most important moments. Just imagine the scene: Mum, I've just failed my A-levels. "Oh, love. I'll stick the kettle on. Chai latte all right?" I know: everyone has their own tastes and mores, and who am I, really, to say that Mandarin Oolong or Coconut Mango Sakura Allure™ isn't worth the mug it's brewed in? I also don't say this as a heathen: good quality tea is essential to making the perfect cup. My dad, for example, wouldn't have PG in the house. (Co-op Indian Prince, actually. Very underrated.) It's just that one of the great virtues of tea, as drunk conventionally in Britain with milk, is its simplicity, its unshowiness. There's a certain art to making a great cup of tea, but the point is anyone can do it. Teavana shows us the folly of over-complicating things. Tea is a fine, versatile drink on its own, and doesn't need pumpkin spice, or lavender sage, or Polonium 210, or whatever, to prosper. It just needs boiling water – and it must be boiling: I really can't emphasise that enough, America – and it needs time. To do it any other way is to diminish it. I get it: it's all about the coin. Starbucks may profess to love coffee, but what it really loves is money: revenues of $3.8bn in the last quarter. It has conquered coffee; why not do the same with tea? And when you're charging $5.95 for a "craft tea fusion" – answers on a postcard, please – you're laughing all the way to the bank. But please, enough with the preciousness. Tea doesn't deserve this – it's doing just fine, thanks. A working kettle, some boiling water, a decent bag and a splash of milk: simple, but devastatingly effective. Sometimes, the best things really don't need any embellishment. And unless the "tea journey" involves drinking too much at a motorway service station and having to turn off at the next exit for a wee – I think I'll pass.
Suspected jihadist Laura H. told the Rotterdam court on Thursday that her husband Ibrahim wanted to commit an attack preferably in the Netherlands, or in another European country. She insists that she did not know what she was doing when she left for Syria in 2015, ANP reports. During the hearing on Thursday, the 21-year-old mother of two young children told the court that she only became aware of terrorist organization Islamic State's violent intentions after she arrived in Iraq. She said she wanted to leave them a few months after she arrived. According to her, her husband Ibrahim was brainwashed and became increasingly dangerous. "He said he wanted to commit an attack, preferably in the Netherlands or in another European country." Laura H. spoke clearly and extensively about how she was under the influence of her violent husband, according to the news wire. She wanted to leave the caliphate, but she stayed with him because she was "confused" and "wanted to be somebody". She also explained that she became more involved in the Islamic faith because she wanted to "belong somewhere". She wants nothing to do with the violent ISIS mindset. The young woman from Leidschendam left the Netherlands with a baby and a toddler in September 2015. A year later she managed to escape the caliphate. With the help of her father and the Kurdish militia, Laura left the ISIS controlled area, with her son in one arm and holding her daughter's hand with the other. Her husband was hit by bullets and remained behind during her flight. Back in the Netherlands, Laura H. was immediately arrested. The Public Prosecutor was initially worried that she returned to commit an attack. No evidence of that could be found, but she is still suspected of participating in a terrorist organization. The court is trying to figure out if the young woman is really as naive as she claims. Several witnesses stated that Laura H. took the lead in going to the caliphate, or at least expressed support for it. She also messaged her father from Iraq, saying that she made a conscious choice to go there and would not be returning. Laura H. told the court that she wrote the messages to her father in that way because she was afraid her husband would see them. The same is true for other positive things she said about ISIS, she said. The Public Prosecutor demanded 35 months in prison against Laura H., 24 months of which conditional. This means that if the court agrees with the Prosecutor's demand, H. will not have to return to prison as she already spent a year in custody.
There are certain strategies in Magic: The Gathering that have lasted down through the ages. There’s “make a bunch of little dudes who get big and attack together.” There is “use counterspells to keep your opponent from playing the game.” There is even, if you’re an old enough player, the “find a weird combo that activates on turn three that wins every single time.” All of these are good, and the upcoming Modern Masters 2017 set (or MMA17) is an ample opportunity for these time-honored strategies to appear in new and weird ways. Unlike Kaladesh, Shadows Over Innistrad, or the tumultuous Zendikar, a Modern Masters set isn’t a story-focused, brand-spanking-new set of cards. Instead, it’s all reprints, a kind of “greatest hits” (much like the Eternal Masters set) that pulls from what is called the “modern era” of Magic. The selection of cards in Modern Masters goes all the way back to 8th Edition, a card set from 2003, and so the kinds of cards that can be reprinted (and thus the strategies that can be present within Modern Masters) are wide and varied. I’m incredibly happy to say that there’s a strong “sacrifice” element to Modern Masters 2017. The idea of sacrificing creatures goes all the way back to the beginning of Magic, and the basic idea is incredibly elegant. You take your creatures, you purposefully kill them, and you get some greater boon from that. Your Mortician Beetle gets bigger when you kill your other, lesser creatures; your Gnawing Zombie gives you a way to kill them; you literally explode your creature into your opponent’s with Bone Splinters. But what about payoff cards? The big, splashy cards that make you dig deep into sacrificing your creatures? What cards in Modern Masters 2017 will make you say “yeah, I’m gonna play this way” when you open them? Here’s a couple of them: These are the kinds of glorious, exciting cards that these reprint sets get me jazzed up about, and I’m now much more excited about playing MMA17 than I was before I saw them. Now I just want to start driving my creatures into the dirt like there’s no tomorrow. Demons and vampires wait for no player. Cameron Kunzelman tweets at @ckunzelman and writes about games at thiscageisworms.com. His latest game, Epanalepsis, was released last year. It’s available on Steam.
Quinton "Rampage" Jackson is taking his talents to Bellator. Jackson, who did not re-sign with the UFC following his unanimous decision loss to Glover Teixeira in January, has signed an exclusive contract with Bellator, according to sources with knowledge of the situation. According to those same sources, Jackson's new deal will be similar to the one "King" Muhammed Lawal signed with the promotion last year, which gave him the opportunity to appear on TNA Impact Wrestling programming on Spike TV. Jackson has flirted with the idea of pursuing a pro wrestling career in the past, and it seems as though he will soon get a chance to showcase himself as a sports entertainer. Jackson's Bellator debut has yet to be finalized, but a fall date appears to be a possibility.
Luis Suarez, the controversial Uruguayan soccer player who bit rival Italian player Giorgio Chiellini in a World Cup match on Wednesday, has an unusual defense for his recent actions. According to The Guardian, Uruguay's football association claims that images of Chiellini's shoulder have been Photoshopped to make the alleged bite marks seem worse than they are. Suarez fell to the ground clutching his teeth after the incident, while Chiellini pulled down his shirt in protest. Although the referee didn't spot Suarez's lunge on Chiellini at the time, World Cup governing body FIFA has charged the Uruguayan player over the incident, delivering a four-month ban on "any football-related activity" on Thursday. Still, Uruguay has rushed to defend Suarez, the country's most important player and one of the most skilled strikers in the world. Alejandro Balbi, Suarez's lawyer and member of the Uruguayan FA, claims that Suarez is being victimized. "We’re going to use all the arguments possible so that Luis gets out in the best possible way," he said. "You shouldn’t forget that we’re rivals of many and we can be for the hosts [Brazil] in the future. This does not go against what might have happened, but there’s no doubt that Suarez is a stone in the shoe for many." Uruguay captain Diego Lugano, meanwhile, said that TV images "don't show anything." "I'd love to see if they have the courage to use video evidence against him." "These situations happen on the pitch," Suarez said in a post-match interview. "We were both just inside the area, he struck me in the chest with his shoulder and he hit me in the eye as well." Chiellini said "Suarez is a sneak and he gets away with it because FIFA wants their stars to play in the World Cup. I'd love to see if they have the courage to use video evidence against him." Suarez has prior history, to say the least. He served a 10-match ban in 2013 for biting Chelsea's Branislav Ivanovic while playing for Liverpool in England's Premier League, and in 2010 Dutch side Ajax suspended him for two games after he bit PSV Eindhoven player Otman Bakkal. Suarez was also banned for eight games in 2011 for racist abuse directed at Manchester United's Patrice Evra.
Carphone Warehouse / Google Just a day before the grand unveiling, it appears Carphone Warehouse has accidentally leaked details and photos of Google's upcoming Pixel and Pixel XL phones. Pages appeared on the company’s website overnight showing official-looking photos and specifications for both headsets. These pages have since been taken down, but not before screengrabs were taken. Advertisement The mistake follows a leaked image that appeared online last month. The leaked picture, obtained by Venture Beat, gave a first full glimpse at the new Google Pixel handset. For a number of months, speculation has been growing about the phone, which will likely be made in two different sizes: one Pixel handset with a 5-inch screen and a larger 5.5-inch model. Hype around the phone's announcement was raised by Google when it revealed it would be holding a launch event on October 4. Read next All the new phones at MWC 2019 from Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, Nokia and more All the new phones at MWC 2019 from Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, Nokia and more Carphone Warehouse / Google However, any remaining excitement about the adoption of the Pixel brand – Google is said to be ditching its Nexus line – may have been spoilt by the latest leak. Advertisement When combined with a previous leak of the two phones' suggested specifications, by Android Police, a near-full picture of the Android phone can be built up. In June, Android Police reported a 5-inch model will have a "1080p display, quad-core 2.0GHz 64-bit processor, 4GB of RAM, 32GB of storage, a 2770 mAh battery, a 12MP rear camera, and an 8MP front camera". The XL Pixel is said to be boosted with the bigger screen a UHD display and a 3450mAh battery. Venture Beat Advertisement Other rumours include: the phone not being waterproof, and a starting price of $649 (£500). Whether the leaks turn out to be true or not, it is incredibly likely Google will be releasing at least one phone or gadget at its event at the start of October. The teaser for the San Fransisco event shows a search bar transforming into the shape of a phone physical "mysterious rectangles" have been seen around San Fransisco. On top of the phones, it has been suggested the company will launch its Amazon Echo competitor – Google Home – a new VR headset, and event a 4K Chromecast.
His shot of Nico Rosberg’s fully-loaded Mercedes tearing through the first right hander soon started spreading around social media as fans – and key figures from the sport – heaped praise on what the image defined. But its impact went truly global when Rosberg himself tweeted it to ask who the photographer was. With 1.6 million followers, Fox’s image was retweeted an impressive 2,100 times and received 5,600 likes as it got people talking. Here, Motorsport.com speaks to some key figures about how the photograph came about, and why it made such an impact. The Photographer PETER FOX: I was at Degner 1 for second free practice on Friday and I went there because I know the cars really load up going through a little compression. I have been there for a number of years before, and I have shots from earlier times, but never have I seen a car loaded up like that. The other cars were going through on the same line but even the ones that were fully loaded up, the attitude of the cars was different – and you could see the front wheel rising in the air. What is particularly interesting is that the rear wheel is massively loaded up and the front wheel is still mostly on the ground. So their suspension is working well. If you look at the next shot, which is out of focus, the car is the complete opposite. The suspension is raised and it’s like the car is momentarily off the ground there. It is amazing how it resets itself again. A few days after the race, Nico put the picture up on Twitter and asked whose it was. I don’t know who initially got it out there, but Nico has a load of followers and once I was mentioned I had to turn my phone off because of all the notifications. It had been beeping and flickering all night. When I woke up in the morning and started reading what everyone had been saying, it really showed the power of an image. I think Mark Gallagher wrote that this picture explains more than we could ever do with words, and that is what a photograph is all about. The Driver NICO ROSBERG: It is an awesome picture – picture of the weekend. It is seldom that you see the forces in an F1 car so clearly on a photograph. It was a special capture – very impressive. Even the tyre was deforming and everything. It was amazing – and it was a normal lap. It wasn’t like something specific happened – it was just like a normal lap. The Team PADDY LOWE: It is great to see a photograph capture an F1 car on the limit. It is a very dramatic photograph. These cars do see incredible loads and if you see some of the pieces being tested in the laboratory at the loads we know they are designed for and the loads they see, the deformation can be really quite shocking. It is quite educational for engineers to see that for real. But that is what happens. I think it has captured a specific moment, as the left rear tyre is particularly stressed at that point. We can see how the whole sidewall if distorted and I am sure there is a dynamic there in the way the camera has just caught the peak of that, making it look particularly extreme. I think sometimes we take it a bit for granted the performance of these cars, and they can sometimes look a little bit tame. But there is some very tough stuff going on there, day in and day out – if only we can keep on showing it. That is why it is important for the TV to continue to work in ways that shows us that. The Tyre MARIO ISOLA: Usually we see this kind of tyre deformation from the data, and we have to take in to account the lateral forces, we see the compression, we see the standing waves – a lot of parameters working on the tyres. Then when you see a picture like that, it has a different effect. I was also watching some images on the monitor today and you see the deformation of the tyre. It is quite impressive and something that we know, and something we consider in our simulation. But in the image it is really extreme. But I can imagine that if you take the right picture – for example in the Eau Rouge compression – you can see something very similar to that, or at the end of a straight. This photograph is a good item to show everybody that the forces acting on the tyres of F1 cars are really, really extreme. So when we are talking about increasing by 1 or 2PSI the pressure, you can easily understand from here. We need air inside the tyre to support this kind of stress. The Rosberg image has been used with kind permission of Peter Fox (@peterjfoxf1). More information and other photographs can be found at http://www.peterjfox.com/
BEGINNING in the late 1990s, pharmaceutical companies selling high-dose opioids seized upon a notion, based on flimsy scientific evidence, that regardless of the length of treatment, patients would not become addicted to opioids. It has proved to be one of the biggest mistakes in modern medicine. An epidemic of prescription drug abuse has swept across the country as a result, and one of the latest victims, according to The New York Times, may have been Prince. The paper reported that he had developed a problem with prescription painkillers, and that just before his death, friends sought urgent medical help from a California doctor who specializes in treating people addicted to pain medication. Whether pain pills played a role in his death won’t be known until the results of an autopsy are released. How did we get this so wrong? The so-called proof that patients would not become addicted was based on a limited number of patients. This was coupled with the idea that opioids should be used for a broad range of indications — including all types of moderate to severe pain when, in fact, they don’t work against all forms of chronic pain.
Padres pitcher Brad Hand has held opponents to a .580 OPS against this season, the fourth-lowest among relievers pitching at least as many innings as he has. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky) Major League Baseball’s nonwaiver trade deadline has recently had a theme. In 2015, ace starters like David Price, Johnny Cueto and Cole Hamels all changed teams before July 31. A year later, star relievers were all the rage, with Aroldis Chapman, Andrew Miller and Mark Melancon finding new homes. Pitching again dominates the stage this season. The Chicago Cubs showed they aren’t ready to yield the National League Central to the Milwaukee Brewers after adding starter Jose Quintana in a deal with the Chicago White Sox, and the Washington Nationals began a bullpen upgrade by acquiring relievers Ryan Madson and Sean Doolittle from the Oakland A’s. [The buyer’s guide to the MLB trade deadline] But there is one reliever on a non-contending team that could change the complexion of any bullpen: Brad Hand of the San Diego Padres. The 27-year-old left-hander increased his strikeout rate year over year (from 30.5 to 31.6 percent) while decreasing his walk rate (from 9.9 to 7.1 percent) resulting in a corresponding drop in ERA (from 2.92 to 2.20). He’s pitched 49 innings of relief this season, holding opponents to a .589 OPS against, the fourth-lowest among relievers pitching at least as many innings this season. Plus, he’s reduced the number of times an opposing batter has hit the ball on the sweet spot of the bat, also known as a barrel, to just 0.52 percent of his pitches thrown this season, significantly lower than 2015 (1.09 percent) and 2016 (0.83 percent). The improvement comes from Hand’s slider, which he now uses almost half the time (43 percent), holding opposing batters to a .120 average against with 55 strikeouts in 92 at-bats ending on the pitch. But he is far from a one-pitch hurler — his four-seam fastball allowed just nine hits in 50 at-bats (.180) with 11 strikeouts, and features an average spin rate of 2,533 rpm in 2017, the ninth-highest among 389 pitchers with at least 100 four-seam fastballs thrown this year. The average spin rate on four-seam fastballs is 2,260 rpm in 2017, with a higher spin rate more positively correlated with swinging strikes and flyballs, making Hand’s fastball coveted by most pitchers in the majors. He won’t come cheap. Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports reported last month San Diego wants a “Will Smith-type return” for Hand, which included right-handed pitcher Phil Bickford, a consensus top-50 prospect, and a young position player in catcher Andrew Susac. ESPN’s Buster Olney tweeted the Padres want something “similar to what the Phillies got for Ken Giles.” Philadelphia received five players from the Houston Astros for Giles, including 23-year-old flamethrower Vince Velasquez and Mark Appel, the No. 1 pick in the 2012 MLB June amateur draft. [As Nationals rebuild their bullpen, how much does playoff experience matter?] Perhaps Hand isn’t worth the price to a team contending for a World Series title. If not, here are six other names to consider as the trade deadline approaches. Zach Britton, RP, Baltimore Orioles Last season, Britton was nearly unhittable. The left-handed reliever allowed a .162 average against with 74 strikeouts in 67 innings pitched, allowing 31 fewer runs than expected after accounting for runners on base and outs left in the inning — making him the most valuable reliever in 2016. He isn’t as spectacular this season, allowing just 3.5 runs fewer than expected, but he induces a large number of groundballs (68 percent of balls put in play) and can keep the ball in the yard — his last home run allowed was to Mookie Betts in April 2016, and the one before that was in September 2015. This time of year, small sample size matters, and tonight, Zach Britton's command is off. Two runs allowed, two hits, wild pitch, a walk. — Buster Olney (@Buster_ESPN) July 21, 2017 Sonny Gray, SP, Oakland Athletics The quintessential ace, Gray is striking out more batters this season (22.7 percent) than he has since 2013, his first year in the majors, despite losing velocity on his fastball since then. Relying on a combination of fastballs, breaking balls and off-speed pitches to keep hitters off balance, Gray’s 3.66 ERA is higher than his 3.36 FIP, which measures what a player’s ERA would look like over a given period of time if the pitcher were to have experienced league average results on balls in play and league average timing. In other words, there might be room to improve after the trade deadline. According to FanGraphs depth chart projections, no available starter is expected to provide more wins above replacement than Gray (1.2 fWAR) for the remainder of the season. Alex Avila, C/1B, Detroit Tigers Avila is having the best season of his nine-year career. The 30-year-old is batting .286 with 11 home runs and a .932 OPS, creating runs at a rate that is 49 percent higher than the league average after accounting for league and park effects (149 wRC+). The #Tigers next trade chip to fall will be catcher Alex Avila, and no team has expressed stronger interest than the #Cubs. It's perfect fit — Bob Nightengale (@BNightengale) July 20, 2017 His plate discipline is much better — he is swinging at a career-low 12.8 percent of pitches out of the zone — and his quality of contact is on the rise, with more than half of his hits classified as “hard hit” by Baseball Info Solutions. His average exit velocity has also improved to 92.3 mph, up from 90.4 mph in 2015. Justin Upton, OF, Detroit Tigers An all-star for the fourth time this season, Upton is batting .273 with a .852 OPS, creating runs at a rate that is 28 percent higher than the league average after accounting for league and park effects (128 wRC+), the 18th highest rate among 63 outfielders qualifying for the batting title. Rest-of-season projections see Upton finishing the year hitting .264 with 13 home runs and a .832 OPS, producing an additional 1.3 wins above replacement. He’s also valuable in the field, where his 11 defensive runs saved ranks sixth among outfielders this season. Jarrod Dyson, OF, Seattle Mariners Dyson is batting .243 with five home runs and 22 stolen bases with 12 defensive runs saved in the field, making him the 20th most-valuable outfielder in the majors this season (2.0 fWAR). His role as a table-setter is also solid — the 32-year-old left-handed hitter has an OPS that is 68 percent higher than the league average when leading off an inning with just eight strikeouts. Only Anthony Rendon and Melky Cabrera have struck out less often with a higher OPS at the start of an inning. Marco Estrada, SP, Toronto Blue Jays Estrada has struggled lately, allowing a 1.045 OPS against in June and 1.054 OPS against in July. His outing against the Detroit Tigers on July 16 was abyssal: four earned runs and five hits in 3 2/3 innings, requiring him to make 94 pitches before getting the hook. [Will the Nationals try to add a starting pitcher?] He’s striking out 25 percent of batters faced while walking 9.3 percent, numbers comparable to last season’s campaign, and his .330 batting average on balls in play (league average is .299) does suggest he is getting unlucky bounces. In fact, based on his pitches and quality of contact allowed, we would expect Estrada to have a .311 weighted on-base average against — which is similar to on-base percentage but accounts for how a player reached base, instead of simply considering whether a player reached base — rather than the .352 wOBA he has heading into his next start. That’s the difference between the batting performances of Mookie Betts (.352 wOBA in 2017), an MVP candidate for the Boston Red Sox, and Orlando Arcia of the Milwalkee Brewers (.311 wOBA).
Spotify Musiker stämmer Spotify på 1,3 miljarder David Lowery, en skollärare från Georgia i USA som också driver banden Cracker och Camper Van Beethoven, har stämt Spotify på motsvarande 1,3 miljarder kronor för att musiktjänsten tillhandahållit en del av hans låtar utan att ha tillgång till licens. Spotify har tidigare varit öppna med att det är problematiskt att alltid veta vem som äger rättigheterna för musik, framför allt i USA där uppgifterna tydligen ofta är felaktiga eller okända. Men innan Spotify har förhandlat klart med National Music Publishers om just detta, försöker sig nu Lowery på att stämma. Spotify har ett speciellt konto där de sätter in provision för de spelade låtar som företaget ännu inte hittat rättigheterna för. Tillsammans med National Music Publishers arbetar de på att komma överens om hur det här ska lösas, så att musiker och artister kan få sina pengar när man väl identifierat dem. David Lowery försöker nu med en stämning krama Spotify på pengar, innan detta avtal blir klart. Tydligen har Spotify inte rättigheterna att strömma en del av hans musik, och för detta vill han ha motsvarande 1,3 miljarder kronor i ersättning. Jag kunde så klart inte låta bli att räkna på hur mycket han egentligen borde få. En artikel hos Billboard nämner fyra låtar det handlar om, som alla kommer från Crackers skiva Berkeley to Bakersfield. Så jag kollade upp hur många spelningar respektive låt har haft: Almond Grove: 28500 Get On Down the Road: 17500 King of Bakersfield: 22000 Tonight I Cross the Border: 15000 Siffrorna är lite avrundade till närmaste 500-tal, men det blir alltså ungefär 83000 spelningar sammanlagt. I en artikel hos The Guardian framgår hur mycket pengar Spotify beräknas betala ut till skivbolagen, tillsammans med en uppgift om hur mycket som går vidare till artisten. 83000 spelningar innebär motsvarande 4900 kronor till skivbolaget, och sedan går 690 kronor vidare till artisten (ja – om siffrorna stämmer så behåller skivbolagen alltså 86 procent av intäkterna för att finansiera… öh… banktransaktionen vidare till artisterna). Utifrån dessa siffror har sålunda David Lowery gått miste om 690 kronor. För detta ekonomiskt brutala bakslag vill han ha 1,3 miljarder kronor i ersättning. Rimligt. Läs också > Skivbolagens girighet dödar Spotify ♥ Gillade du artikeln? ⇨ Dela gärna på Facebook & Twitter! Follow @tkj
There was a moment in the second quarter of Sunday’s win over the Cowboys when Tom Brady did one of the things that Tom Brady does best. At the time there were less than four minutes left in the half. The score was tied 3-3. The Patriots had the ball, first and goal at the one yard line and Brady took the snap, ducked his head and barreled one yard into the end zone. The old Brady dive! A few seconds later he emerged from the pile, crow hopped and spiked the ball like he was Bill Brasky’s younger brother. To Tom Brasky! The vine is great but seriously just look at this picture. That’s statue material. You can’t see his eyes but that’s OK because they’d melt your brain. Brady literally tried to fire that ball through the Earth and when he was done he unleashed a wild fist pump, stared into the crowd and screamed “LET’S GO!” The touchdown gave New England a 10-3 lead, and they never looked back on their way to a 30-6 victory, a 4-0 record — and now, Indianapolis. * You ever wonder where the Patriots would be without Judge Richard Berman? Like let’s say the offseason played out identically right up until that federal court ruling, but instead of embarrassment for the NFL, some more conservative judge double stamped the punishment and upheld every ounce of Roger Goodell’s power. Now let’s say Brady had enough. Let’s say Bill Belichick really had enough. Let’s say it became clear that the NFL is too powerful and an appeal was just a waste of time. Let’s say Brady served the four game suspension. Now this Sunday marks his first game back. What’s the Patriots record? It’s hard to guess when we don’t really know what Jimmy Garoppolo’s made of, but even the best quarterbacks struggle at first. Maybe not every game but certainly in select games, and games like Week 2 in Buffalo or last week in Dallas or even opening night against Pittsburgh were tailor made for growing pains. Realistically, 2-2 is probably the best case scenario under Jimmy G, and that’s not tragic, but with the way the Bengals and Broncos are playing, a 2-2 start could’ve cost the Pats home field advantage; it could’ve meant an extra playoff game. Obviously we’ll see where this goes in real life, but a 2-2 or even a 1-3 start would’ve injected some real urgency and chaos into Brady’s return. Amidst all the excitement, there’d be that underlying truth that, “Hey, Tom doesn’t have much time to get it together here. The Pats can’t afford for him to ease back in.” And it doesn’t matter what the Colts look like so far this year, Sunday night in Indianapolis isn’t exactly a Welcome Party. If it was they’d have a big “2015 Welcome Party” banner in the rafters. But either way that doesn’t matter because Judge Berman is a hero and Brady hasn’t skipped a beat. Instead of returning this Sunday draped in urgency and chaos, Brady will walk into Lucas Oil stadium with the confidence of a Terminator and the willful determination of every Liam Neeson character spliced into one. Brady’s not frantically searching for rhythm, he’s floating through the air comfortably at 200 miles an hour. And he’s angry. And you can’t blame him. * In so many ways it’s so hard to feel bad for Tom Brady, so let’s not feel bad for him. But let’s also realize how much DeflateGate screwed with his life. Not his football life but his real life as a human being with a wife and children and parents and siblings. When you think about it he (and to a certain extent Dorito Dink and the Deflator) is the only one who really suffered during this mess. The media complained but they loved it. They made piles of money with it. There were careers made during DeflateGate. Meanwhile fans complained but that didn’t stop them from clicking, watching and listening in record numbers; it was a nice distraction from the Red Sox. And while it might seem like Roger Goodell was a big loser in all this, was he really? Does he look any dumber or more sinister than he did before? He was already a gigantic loser and this was just another notch on his belt. But Brady? Yeah, Brady suffered. He was the butt of so many jokes, and that’s fine, but there were also so many angry verbal and personal attacks from desperate local loud mouths like Shaughnessy and Massarotti, and then nationally on every show across every channel and station. You know his kids heard some of that. There are also rumors that all the drama messed with his marriage and while rumors are just rumors in this case it would make sense. You’d understand if he wasn’t the same laid back and sensitive Offseason Tom that Gisele is used to. You can see this raising a few issues. And remember the fire in Brady’s father’s voice as he berated that radio troll in San Francisco? “It's all lies,” the Brady Sr. screamed. “It’s all ESPN, it’s all NFL propaganda. The only person that's testified under oath in this is Tom Brady. We know Goodell is lying. He lied in the Ray Rice case, he lied in this case and has lied in the Peterson case. How many times do you need to know this guy is a flaming liar?” You know that the younger Brady feels the same way but you know he’d never voice it like that. He can’t. He’d have nothing to gain. Instead Brady’s only revenge happens between the lines, and that’s why he’s on this mission. While SpyGate was Bill Belichick's chance to embarrass a league that did him wrong, DeflateGate is Brady’s — and he knows where it started. And this Sunday he’s Beatrix Kiddo walking into Bill’s house. What happens next is — well, we’ll see. You know Brady would love nothing more than to spread the field all night, stand tall in the pocket, carve up that defense and embarrass an entire city on national TV. Actually, no. There’s one thing he’d love even more than that. A QB dive from the goal line and one giant spike to deflate all the demons. Follow me on Twitter @rich_levine
After the Raiders stunned the Chiefs, it appears that KC Chiefs CB Marcus Peters took the BART back with Raiders RB Marshawn Lynch. They’re both from Oakland. You can hear them giving Peters a hard time here (“F the Chiefs”): message from beastmode to marcus peters pic.twitter.com/0ZWwmHQtKN — chris (@chandaye) October 20, 2017 Marshawn Lynch& Marcus Peters took the BART train home last night & Beast Mode got people on the train to chant “fuck the Chiefs” Hilarious. — Jamal (PHI 5-1) (@FinneseBuckets) October 20, 2017 IM ON THE BART WITH MARSHAWN LYNCH pic.twitter.com/e0Bu7wQhCk — chris (@chandaye) October 20, 2017 Bart ride after the game. One of the funnest night of the year. @mpjuiceman @beastmode @bmpllc24 A post shared by Squint (@iamsquint) on Oct 19, 2017 at 11:58pm PDT Marshawn was ejected from the game after running onto the field to apparently protect Peters, who was about to get into it with the Raiders linemen after hitting Derek Carr late. It was reported that Marshawn left the stadium after being ejected. However, pictures later showed he was in the stands hanging out. In the stands! Then, after the game, they took the BART home. I gotta know though: Did Peters go back on the team plane with the Chiefs? Is that normal not to do that in a situation like this?
Marvel Studios, IMAX, and Mondo have teamed up for a special poster that you can only get one way: by attending a Midnight showing ofin IMAX on opening night. The last in the "IMAX 12:01" poster program, this poster by comic book extraordinaire JOCK will be extremely limited and only given away here. In case you somehow don't know anything about this movie yet (in which case, welcome to Newsarama for the first time!), here's the official boiler plate for the film. "Marvel’s “Iron Man 3” pits brash-but-brilliant industrialist Tony Stark/Iron Man against an enemy whose reach knows no bounds. When Stark finds his personal world destroyed at his enemy's hands, he embarks on a harrowing quest to find those responsible. This journey, at every turn, will test hismettle. With his back against the wall, Stark is left to survive by his own devices, relying on his ingenuity and instincts to protect those closest to him. As he fights his way back, Stark discovers the answer to the question that has secretly haunted him: does the man make the suit or does the suit make the man? "Starring Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Rebecca Hall, Stephanie Szostak, James Badge Dale with Jon Favreau and Ben Kingsley, Marvel’s “Iron Man 3” is directed by Shane Black from a screenplay by Drew Pearce & Shane Black and is based on Marvel’s iconic Super Hero Iron Man, who first appeared on the pages of “Tales of Suspense” (#39) in 1963 and had his solo comic book debut with “The Invincible Iron Man” (#1) in May of 1968. "“Iron Man 3” is presented by Marvel Studios in association with Paramount Pictures and DMG Entertainment. Marvel Studios’ President Kevin Feige is producing and Jon Favreau, Louis D’Esposito, Charles Newirth, Victoria Alonso, Stephen Broussard, Alan Fine, Stan Lee and Dan Mintz are executive producers. The film releases May 3, 2013, and is distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures."
Tubing manufacturer Reynolds has just announced the addition of a new 921 stainless steel tubeset to its range. The new tubeset is cold-worked to a claimed tensile strength of 1000MPa - 953 is 1800+ MPa and 931 is 1300MPa. It’s not as high tensile as 853 (1400MPa) and is closer to 725 in strength and weight, but it is stainless. It’s far too soon for prices but we expect it to be cheaper than 953 and 931, but more most likely costlier than 853. Apparently it’s already extensively used in the aviation industry for highly stressed hydraulic lines and marine, oil and gas industries because of its high resistance to corrosion. It’s known in those industries as “21-6-9”, because it’s made using 21% Chromium, 6 % Nickel and 9% Manganese. It’s an attractive tubeset for framebuilders because it’s easier to work with than the top-end 953 stainless steel tubeset, which is well renowned for being difficult to work with. That and tooling for 631 and 725 tubesets can be used with 921. The tubeset isn’t heat treated, it gets its strength for work hardening (cold working) so it’s easily formed and manipulated by the builder. The tubeset is suitable for TIG welded and lugged frames. We asked Albert Steward from Genesis Bikes what he thought of the news, here’s what he had to say: “At just over 1000mpa it's similar in tensile strength to 725 and therefore represents a versatile, highly workable, framebuilder-friendly tubeset with none of the associated labour and tool-wear intensive attributes that come with the higher-grade stainless tubesets like 931 and 953. “For the customer, the high 21% Chromium content should ensure excellent anti-corrosive properties (better than 931/953 even) and long-lasting good looks and a Reynolds stainless steel frame at a much lower price than was previously possible. Reynolds are currently testing compatibility in TIG format with their other stainless tubesets - for us this would be a really exciting proposition.” That Ted James has already been working with 921, and has built a frame that passes the EN14781 frame fatigue test. Here he is in a video talking about what it’s like working with 921. Ted was asked by Reynolds to work on the new tubeset to build a test frame to demonstrate the new tubeset. Ted says it would be a great tubeset for touring bikes as it is lightweight, strong and because it’s stainless, durable. He also says it’s easier to work with than 953, thicker walls and easier to cut. Orders are currently being taken with delivery expected in early 2014. We'll keep you updated on the first 921 framesets to become available.
THE America’s Cup has never seen anything like this. When Team New Zealand’s 50-foot catamaran speeds around Bermuda’s Great Sound, four of the six crewmen are hunched over, furiously pedalling away. That’s right, mate, pedalling. When the red-and-black cat tacks or gybes, the “cyclors” unclip from their cycling pedestals in one hull, join the choreographed dash across the trampoline netting stretched across the boat and clip into the cycling pedestals in the other hull, and continue pedalling away. One of the cyclors, 28-year-old Simon van Velthooven, has an Olympic bronze medal in track cycling. He might soon be an America’s Cup champion if the Kiwis’ astoundingly fast design package, of which the cycling system is just one component, whisks them to victory against two-time defending champion Oracle Team USA. The Kiwis replaced grinders and their arm power with the cyclors. Their pedalling powers the hydraulic systems used to trim the wingsail and raise and lower the daggerboards, or retractable centerboards, that are tipped with hydrofoils. LIVE stream the 2017 America’s Cup Final on FOX SPORTS. Get a free 2-week Foxtel Now trial now & stream LIVE within minutes. SIGN UP NOW > Cyclors for Emirates Team New Zealand pedal Josh Junior makes his way across the boat. Source: AP When the cats reach a certain speed, they rise up on the leeward daggerboard and rudders, with the hulls completely out of the water. Daggerboards on both hulls are in the water for a few moments during tacks and gybes. The actual sailing is done by helmsman Peter Burling, 26, an Olympic gold and silver medallist; skipper Glenn Ashby, 39, an Olympic silver medallist and multihull whiz who controls the wingsail with an Xbox-like device; and Blair Tuke, 27, Burling’s Olympic teammate who has a dual role of cyclor and foil trimmer. This is the first time cyclists have powered a boat in the America’s Cup match. A Swedish team tried a cycling system in an unsuccessful challenge in 1977. “If you have half a brain and you know that your legs are stronger than your arms, why wouldn’t you give it a go?” van Velthooven said. Team New Zealand won the first four races against Oracle Team USA last weekend and leads 3-0. It started with a negative point because Oracle Team USA, owned by billionaire Larry Ellison, won the qualifiers. Racing resumes on Saturday (Sunday morning AEST). The underfunded but always crafty Kiwis, the hard-luck losers in the 2013 America’s Cup, began secretly working on the cycling system three years ago in Auckland. When their test boat was launched in February, there was surprise and scepticism from outsiders. Team New Zealand helmsman Peter Burling. Source: AP Oracle, of course, had team members watching from a spy boat. “I think they said, ‘Ah, we heard rumours that you’ve been testing but we never thought you’d actually bloody do it,’ ” van Velthooven said. “It was good to keep it 100 per cent secret until the boat rolled out.” Other than the bike seats that can be seen in the cockpits, little is known of the system. And the Kiwis aren’t real chatty about it. “It doesn’t look like a bike at all. Just imagine a set of cranks and that’s about it, really,” van Velthooven said. Does it have a chain? “No comment. Not yet,” he said. He does let on that the cyclors wear mountain bike shoes and use mountain bike pedals. “It’s purely high performance and it does its job well and it’s been designed well and it’s been designed really light,” van Velthooven said. Van Velthooven, 28, said he learned to sail while growing up but veered into cycling. He won the bronze medal in keirin at the 2012 Olympics. When he didn’t make the world championship team for track cycling in 2015, Team New Zealand called and asked him to test their cycling system. Emirates Team New Zealand sails during a training session in Bermuda. Source: AP “It was a big hurdle when they actually put the test bikes in the race boat,” he said. “They had mocked it up in the shed. It looked funny then to us. We were either going to be the laughing-stock or the best power source the Cup has seen. It’s worked out well.” Van Velthooven’s spot is in front. On days when there are multiple races, he swaps out with Joe Sullivan, an Olympic rowing champion. “Position one is more of a mercenary. We just go as hard as we can and let the other guys not pedal as hard so they’re dialled in for all the races,” van Velthooven said. Van Velthooven calls the cyclor system “a 10th of 10 different things that are all working at the same time to give a package that’s 100 per cent awesome. Blair and Glenn have almost unlimited hydraulic fluid to play with when racing gets heated. It’s just awesome that it’s all worked out, all the ideas that the designers had and then for the machinists and boat builders to build it, and then to go out there on the water and actually see it working as we dreamed it, is a pretty awesome thing to deliver for the boys.” The America’s Cup resumes on Sunday morning (3am AEST) and is broadcast live on Fox Sports Australia.
Guardian reporter David Hopps reports in a story published by the Sydney Morning Herald that former Australia cricket team captain Steve Waugh is advocating the use of lie detectors in an attempt to root out corruption in the scandal-plagued sport. Excerpt: ANDREW Strauss and Mahendra Singh Dhoni will be encouraged to help stamp out corruption in cricket by taking lie-detector tests as the MCC uses the occasion of the 2000th Test match to step up its campaign to clean up the game. The controversial proposal is the brainchild of former Australia captain Steve Waugh, who wants leading captains such as Strauss and Dhoni to act as ambassadors and role models by voluntarily putting their reputations on the line. But the proposal is not supported by the Australian Cricketers’ Association, because lie-detector tests are not admissible in court. ”I applaud Steve Waugh for looking at creative and proactive ways to deal with corruption, but we wouldn’t support the use of polygraphs at this point in time,” ACA chief executive Paul Marsh said. ”Results can be affected if you’re nervous or under stress or whatever, so there may be reasons, other than not telling the truth, that you fail it and we couldn’t open players up to that.” Waugh is at Lord’s as chairman of an MCC world cricket committee working party that was charged last year with investigating ways corruption might be eradicated. He made his chief proposal only metres away from where Strauss and Dhoni supervised practice ahead of a Test series that will decide whether England or India finish the summer as the No 1 team in the world. The Australia Cricketers’ Association is right to reject lie detector “testing,” as it has no scientific basis. While polygraphy is inherently biased against truth-tellers, the “test” can trivially be defeated using simple countermeasures that anyone can learn and polygraph operators cannot detect. It is heartening to see that the Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations has also come out strongly against lie detector “testing,” as ESPN Cricinfo reports: Lie detectors should not be used to investigate corruption in cricket as many courts around the world refuse to recognise their validity, according to the international players’ chief Tim May. Steve Waugh, a member of the MCC Cricket Committee, has proposed the use of lie detectors to expose players involved in fixing matches, and he took a polygraph this week to show how they worked. And while the England captain Andrew Strauss said he liked the idea of using lie detectors and would be happy to take a polygraph if they were introduced to catch corrupt cricketers, not all cricket figures share his opinion. May, the chief executive of the Federation of International Cricketers Associations (FICA), said his organisation “rejected outright” the idea of using lie detectors. “I commend MCC and Steve Waugh for trying to be proactive in the fight against corruption, but lie detector tests are far from foolproof and not permissible as a means of determining people’s guilt or innocence in the courts of the majority, if not all, cricketing territories,” May said. “It is therefore totally unacceptable that players should be put under pressure to submit to testing that is far from foolproof. “To publicly request players to make ‘some stand’ against corruption, by submitting to this ‘imperfect’ testing is irresponsible and FICA will oppose such actions in the strongest possible manner. The testing is far from foolproof – that’s why it’s not allowed to convict people in a court of law. “It’s a no win situation for the players – they quite rightly should decline to submit to one – the testing is not foolproof, the players are not under suspicion for any corruption offence but now with the MCC publicly encouraging them to submit to one, if the player refuses, it looks like he is hiding something.” May said he had written to the MCC to air FICA’s concerns over the matter. The Cricket Committee, which met at Lord’s this week, also suggested that the ICC’s Anti Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) should have the power to perform sting operations similar to that staged by the News of the World last year against Salman Butt, Mohammad Amir and Mohammad Asif. It should be noted that Steve Waugh’s proposal to polygraph cricketers is not something new. A proposal to polygraph cricketers every six months was considered and quite rightly rejected back in 2001. Australian journalists covering this story would do well to speak with John Furedy, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of Toronto and polygraph expert who is now back home in Australia.
Move it, bud, pot outlets are told Cardillo, a onetime ophthalmic technician, said he adheres to the law and runs his shops as nonprofits. That's why he drives a beat-up Camaro, he said, and not a "for-profit 911 Turbo." Nevertheless, his days of surfside healing may be coming to an end. Venice -- with dispensaries, pot doctors and bong merchants all a flip-flop stroll from the beach -- is the example critics typically cite to highlight the consequences of Los Angeles' failure to control medical marijuana. But there are less-vivid pot hot spots across the city. "It's proven that being by the beach can actually heal a person and make a person feel good," Cardillo said as he smoked a joint in a hazy, mirrored lounge. "We're trying to create this place where people can heal, and they're looking at it like, oh, it's not really that." The Kush Clubhouse and the Medical Kush Beach Club boast killer views of the ocean, and that's what Sean Cardillo says he was after when he opened the only medical marijuana dispensaries on the Venice Beach boardwalk. More than five years after the City Council began discussing medical marijuana dispensaries, Los Angeles Ordinance No. 181069 takes effect Monday. Shaped by the council's conviction that the proliferation of marijuana dispensaries was fueled by a passion for cash and not a compassion for patients, the ordinance seeks to rewind the Wild West period in which 600 dispensaries opened. The ordinance shuts down more than 400 stores that appeared in the last 2 1/2 years. Dispensaries that registered with the city in 2007 will have six months to comply with new location restrictions, which will force many to move to isolated areas. City prosecutors have declined to spell out how they will enforce the ordinance. "Our next step will be to ascertain the level of compliance," said Jane Usher, a special assistant city attorney. She said her office would rely on reports from police officers, building inspectors and neighbors to identify violators. Offenders face civil penalties of $2,500 a day and six months in jail. At least 64 dispensaries, including Cardillo's, have sued and asked for court orders to halt enforcement. Stewart Richlin, a lawyer who represents 10 of them, said he expects many across the city to remain open Monday. "The collectives are going to have to make heavy decisions," he said. Cardillo, calling it a stressful time, said he would close the Kush Clubhouse for now. The Beach Club, while legally registered, stands too close to a residential building and possibly a playground, and the business must be moved within six months. "I don't want to do anything to disrespect the city. I'm not in this to do anything illegal," he said. Fellow plaintiff Dan Halbert, who runs Rainforest Collective in Mar Vista, said he also will close but plans to post a sign on his darkened storefront that reads: "12 jobs lost. 10's of 1000's of dollars in tax revenues lost. Another vacant building in L.A. Drugs back on the streets. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!!!" Dispensary patron Nicholas Fasoline sat at the Beach Club's $13,000 laminated-wood hash bar after he had driven down from Moorpark for "the sun, the beach, the girls and the hash." He said Los Angeles ought to leave the older, established dispensaries like the Beach Club alone, but shut down newer ones. "Every corner, there's a weed shop?" he said. "It doesn't need to be that many." Venice is not the only marijuana marketplace. In Woodland Hills, West Valley Caregivers, West Valley Patients Group, Green Magic, Green Joy and Green Hills cluster together on Ventura Boulevard. In Van Nuys, police raids culled a once-dense concentration of shops at Van Nuys and Victory boulevards. Michael Larsen, the neighborhood council president in Eagle Rock, said the ruckus had calmed down, but residents have recently complained about disruptive dispensary customers. "They're in their death throes in a sense, so I expect some shenanigans," he said.
The scenario goes like this: Its 1996; you're an astronaut and you're looking at a UFO. This is quite possibly the biggest, most game-changing scientific discovery in the history of mankind. And here you are, gliding through space in low Earth orbit, watching this alien craft dance around your video camera's viewfinder. You are not alone--there are other astronauts onboard the space shuttle, and mission control is watching the live feed from Houston. Yet not a single raised voice or mention of ETs or UFOs can be heard on the audio of this recording. Apparently, it's just another routine brush with extraterrestrial life, and another day in the life of a massive, decades-long, multiagency coverup. This is the claim behind the recent posting of a batch of NASA-related clips on YouTube, presented as evidence that extraterrestrials are among us. The footage covers a number of missions, and a range of mysterious objects--in a clip featured on the science fiction blog io9, a bizarre object rotates within the frame, seeming to morph from one shape to another as the cameraman casually tracks it. If that weren't mysterious enough, at one point, a light drifts by. The post's headline poses the question: "Will the US Government Finally Admit There Are Aliens?" Whether or not the government has anything to fess up about aliens, the astronaut who shot that particular piece of footage has nothing to hide. Mario Runco was a mission specialist on board STS-77, a space shuttle mission that launched in May of 1996. One of the crew's objectives was to deploy an experimental satellite, the Passive Aerodynamically Stabilized Magnetically Damped Satellite Test Unit (PAM-STU). The PAM-STU was roughly the size of a trash can, and was designed to test a new approach to satellite maneuverability, using the planet's magnetic field to perform attitude adjustments (instead of firing thrusters). The crew filmed the spinning satellite for days, but in the clip posted on YouTube by Martyn Stubb, the PAM-STU appears in grainy, low-light-enhanced black and white. Its two Stimsonite reflectors--the same materials used on road and bicycle reflectors--catch the ambient light, and at one point appear to merge into a single bright spot as the satellite turns head-on. "The lights moving by in the background are either isolated lights on the ground or stars, I think likely the latter," Runco says. Astronauts test the PAM-STU. In another of Stubb's posted clips, a view through the window of a space shuttle shows lights drifting along in space, then reversing direction and darting away with a flash. The title of that clip: "UFOs quickly take off on NASA video." Again, the reality is less dramatic. Thomas Jones, a former shuttle mission specialist and payload commander and co-author of Planetology: Unlocking the Secrets of the Solar System, was on that mission--STS-80, which also took place in 1996--and provided this description of the footage. "A few ice crystals or flakes of thruster residue in the near field are floating by, get hit by a thruster exhaust plume and zip out of the scene." Ice crystals hit by the thruster exhaust plume. UFO proponents tend to dismiss official responses from members of NASA, the Pentagon or any other government agency, but Runco says that even if there was an active coverup, no amount of coercion could prevent an astronaut--himself included--from laying claim to a confirmed sighting of an alien spaceship. "If I thought it was an intelligent craft, I'd be the first one to speak up," says Runco. "I'd want the credit: Mario Runco was the first person in history to conclusively document the existence of an extraterrestrial civilization. Why would I ever want to keep it secret?" Neither Runco nor Jones have any illusions about the likelihood of dispelling NASA-related UFO myths, particularly when Stubb and others are able to collect and repurpose an ever-growing catalog of footage. "There's no way to keep people from using public domain footage for silly purposes," Jones says. "If a shuttle beams back 10 hours of Earth views each day, there are bound to be images and scenes that are misunderstood or taken out of context." If anything, it's the lack of context that many UFO theories and proponents rely on. The clips posted by Stubb and others, whether they originate with NASA or a less credible source, tend to be framed only by a short title, with little or no attempt at reporting (Runco notes that anyone could have simply e-mailed or called him, to ask for his side of the story, instead of simply posting a 13-year-old video and jumping to extraterrestrial conclusions). Specificity might be the currency of the conspiracy theory set, with seemingly random images or snippets of data woven into a matrix of sinister intent, but even a casual investigation of each of those facts can punch holes in the larger plotline. Bloggers continue to reference an interview with Buzz Aldrin in 2005 about seeing a UFO while on Apollo 11, while brushing off his claims that television producers blatantly quoted him out of context. And although UFO proponents have welcomed recent public statements from former astronaut Edgar Mitchell about his belief in an extraterrestrial coverup dating back to Roswell, Mitchell has never said he witnessed anything alien with his own eyes. Lacking quality in their evidence, UFO believers are left with quantity, a rambling collection of indistinct imagery and allegations that now includes a batch of space shuttle mission video clips that were never buried or classified in the first place. Runco points out that astronauts, in general, are excited by the notion of intelligent species on other worlds. "Many of them use SETI@Home [a distributed computing application that picks through radio telescope data for incoming messages] as their screensavers, because they think it's a possibility," he says. But it's one thing to believe that alien life is a statistical likelihood, and another to interpret lights in the sky as intergalactic contact. "People see unexplained things," Jones says. "I used to believe UFOs were spaceships--when I was 14."
We are pleased to announce the beginning of the public discussion process that we expect to result in version 4.0 of the Creative Commons license suite. Timeliness and Opportunity The 4.0 discussions held at the 2011 Global Summit confirmed for CC the need to commence the 4.0 discussion process now if we wish to consider issues relevant to important would-be adopters in a timely manner. As explained following legal sessions at the Summit, version 3.0 is working (and will continue to work) really well for many adopters, but the reality is different for others. The treatment of sui generis database rights in the 3.0 licenses continues to be a show-stopper for many, including governments in Europe. This fosters an environment in which custom licenses proliferate, inevitably resulting in silos of incompatibly-licensed content that cannot be maximally shared and remixed. But there exist still other reasons for pursuing 4.0 at this time, including the desire to adjust the licenses to more fully support adoption by intergovernmental organizations and those looking for a more internationally-oriented license suite. CC BY, Version 3.0 The consequence of not addressing these challenges now is one of opportunity — bridging these differences sooner rather than later (where possible) is always advisable, especially if a more inclusive commons may result. For those fond of version 3.0, rest assured that CC will continue to support existing and future implementations and adopters that rely on those licenses. We will take pains not to create a 4.0 suite that undermines or otherwise presents challenges for those communities. Process – Discussion Forum – 4.0 Wiki Importantly, for the first time in CC’s history we begin the versioning process without publishing a draft of the new licenses for review. This is intentional, and it is designed to ensure we hear from the community first. During this 2-3 month requirements gathering period, we urge everyone with a proposal, concern or other input to please put it forth, as our goal is to make the first draft as comprehensive as possible. We will alert the community when the requirements period draws to a close, expected to be mid-February 2012. As in the past, we will publish at least two drafts of the licenses before finalizing, which we anticipate will occur late 2012. As with past versioning efforts, the central discussion forum will be CC’s license discuss list (subscribe now). New to the 4.0 process, however, is a dedicated group of wiki pages (accessible through the main 4.0 wiki page) where topics and proposals under discussion on that email list will be documented, annotated, and evaluated. We have pre-populated the wiki pages with several of the issues we expect to address during this process, framing key topics to help shape the discussion and including known and anticipated proposals related to each. Among others, we expect healthy debates regarding the treatment of moral rights, the definition of NonCommercial, scope of ShareAlike, treatment of sui generis database rights, and much more. The issues are organized by topic with cross-references to related issues throughout the wiki, but there is also an open forum (the Sandbox page) where you should be encouraged to suggest other topics you feel are important to discuss for version 4.0 (a few placeholders already exist). For a fuller description of CC’s objectives, the process and expected schedule, visit the 4.0 wiki homepage. We encourage everyone who is interested in the future of Creative Commons, and open licensing generally, to participate in this process. The more voices that chime in to raise issues and debate the merits of various proposals, the stronger version 4.0 will be, helping us achieve our goal of creating a set of robust licenses that will endure long into the future. If you have an opinion about how to simplify CC’s attribution requirements, for example, or any of the other important issues we plan to examine during the process, please post your suggestion to the CC license discuss list (subscribe today) and add it to our 4.0 wiki. We look forward to hearing from you. Support CC The Version 4.0 process and many other activities are supported by contributions from our community. As a global nonprofit organization that enables sharing and reuse of creativity and knowledge through free legal tools, Creative Commons has always relied on the generosity of both individuals and organizations to fund its ongoing operations. Please consider donating to our Annual Campaign, going on now. Thank you.
There are guards everywhere. Cinder in Marie Antoinette's bedroom You can also help by rating Cinder at IFDB Secret Agent Cinder Get this revolution started Published: 5 August 2015 In this game, you play as a revolutionary agent Cinder. Your mission is to infiltrate the Royal Ball, dodge the guards and steal the Secret Military Plans, all before midnight. The opulence of Versailles disgusts you as you walk through the gilded rooms. Then there is the prince who keeps getting in your way. It took about 6 weeks of drawing, coding and testing to make this playable version. I enjoyed making the rooms of Versailles true to the original . Made with Twine . Secret Agent Cinder won the 2015 XYZZY award for Best Use of Multimedia. Russian version of the game . Thanks to Alexander Yakovlev for translating!Share on: g+
Okay, here’s a new vocabulary word for you: skeuomorphism. And believe it or not, it’s a Thing. Skeuomorphism has several definitions. Basically it's something archaic and unneeded in a design. Our culture is full of them. It’s like how architect Howard Roark describes the Parthenon in Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead: “copies in steel and concrete of copies in plaster of copies in marble of copies in wood.” So what does that have to do with IT? When people first started using computers — particularly PCs — skeuomorphism was used deliberately to get people familiarized with these new devices. Excel looked like a classic spreadsheet. Calendars looked like Daytimers. Contact files looked like Rolodexes. See how simple it is? You know how to use these things! Don’t be afraid! However, as time went on, computers got more processing power and better resolution. But instead of using these new capabilities to develop better, more powerful applications, people started using them to design even more realistic interfaces for the applications, with shadows, appropriate glare and other lighting effects, even more detailed imagery for icons, appropriate sound effects like the clicking of cameras and of keys, and on and on. Moreover, some of these design choices were actually starting to get in the way of using the application. Sure, when PCs first came out, it made sense to click on the picture of the floppy disk to save a “file” (which is, itself, a skeuomorphism). But nowadays, you’ve got employees who’ve never seen a floppy disk, and the symbol is no longer intuitive for them, meaning it needs to be explained — which sort of defeats the purpose of having a skeuomorphic interface in the first place. (Incidentally, did you know that 5 1/4'” floppy disks are that size because they were first conceived of in a bar and they were the size of the cocktail napkins? Really!) This became even more of a problem when mobile devices came along, bringing all those same tired old limitations with them, in the name of “usability.” Those incredibly detailed icons got really hard to see on a teeny-weeny phone screen. And in an age where people are communicating with each other using two thumbs, we’re still using a keyboard layout where it’s said (true or not) that it was originally designed to slow people down because the mechanical stalks of a typewriter got tangled up if people typed too fast. Ironically, one of the biggest offenders in this whole skeuomorphism thing has been Apple, which has used detailed textures and backgrounds for many of its apps, and has even come under criticism for it. In fact, believe it or not, there was a big schism in the company over skeuomorphism, and it recently decided it was going to move away from its skeuomorphistic past and into a more flat future — following Microsoft’s lead with user interfaces such as Metro. Yes, you read right — Microsoft is now considered to be doing more cutting-edge design than Apple. So now the design aesthetic is going the other way — toward simple. (Which we like.) Eliminate the extraneous clutter that looks nice but takes up space and processing time and doesn’t scale well to different form factors. Beautiful, detailed, photorealism is making way for elegant, simple, and flat. (In fact, Vanity Fair makes a pretty good case that app design is about the only design change we’ve seen in the past twenty years.) And this is where you come in. When you’re designing something, whether it’s a form, an application, a process — think about why you’re doing something the way you are. Are you putting in lines for people to write on? Are you assuming an 8 ½ x 11 piece of paper? Is there a way that the information people are entering can be repurposed to another application without them having to retype it? Are you assuming a two-day response window because that’s how long interoffice mail took in the day of yellow envelopes with all the names crossed out on the front? “The work environment of 1997 is not the work environment of 2013. Social, mobile, web and cloud have unleashed a tidal wave of digital communication — potential business records — that the skeuomorphic experience of many RM tools simply cannot address. The majority of information workers are no longer n00bs when it comes to engaging with electronic content. Yet many vendors continue to impose the mental construct of paper on a digital-first workforce,” writes Forrester analyst Cheryl McKinnon. “How can enterprises and their solution providers fully embrace the opportunities for innovation with automated classification or categorization when the user experience is still wired for folders, trucks and trash bins?” There’s a story about a young bride who wanted to learn to cook a roast, so she asked her mom, who told her, you cut the ends off the roast, put the roast in the pan, and cook it for so long at such-and-such a temperature. And she asked her mom why she cut the ends off, and her mom said she didn’t know, but that was how her mom had taught her. So they went to Grandma, and asked her, and she said she didn’t know, but that was how her mom had taught her. So they went to Great-Grandma, and she said, oh, because we had a small oven and a whole roast wouldn’t fit. Make sure that in your design, you’re not cutting the ends off the roast.
Whistleblower Says Spy Agency Targeting Top American Leaders NSA whistleblower Russel Tice – a key source in the 2005 New York Times report that blew the lid off the Bush administration’s use of warrantless wiretapping – tells Peter B. Collins: Tice: Okay. They went after–and I know this because I had my hands literally on the paperwork for these sort of things–they went after high-ranking military officers; they went after members of Congress, both Senate and the House, especially on the intelligence committees and on the armed services committees and some of the–and judicial. But they went after other ones, too. They went after lawyers and law firms. All kinds of–heaps of lawyers and law firms. They went after judges. One of the judges is now sitting on the Supreme Court that I had his wiretap information in my hand. Two are former FISA court judges. They went after State Department officials. They went after people in the executive service that were part of the White House–their own people. They went after antiwar groups. They went after U.S. international–U.S. companies that that do international business, you know, business around the world. They went after U.S. banking firms and financial firms that do international business. They went after NGOs that–like the Red Cross, people like that that go overseas and do humanitarian work. They went after a few antiwar civil rights groups. So, you know, don’t tell me that there’s no abuse, because I’ve had this stuff in my hand and looked at it. And in some cases, I literally was involved in the technology that was going after this stuff. And you know, when I said to [former MSNBC show host Keith] Olbermann, I said, my particular thing is high tech and you know, what’s going on is the other thing, which is the dragnet. The dragnet is what Mark Klein is talking about, the terrestrial dragnet. Well my specialty is outer space. I deal with satellites, and everything that goes in and out of space. I did my spying via space. So that’s how I found out about this. Collins: Now Russ, the targeting of the people that you just mentioned, top military leaders, members of Congress, intelligence community leaders and the–oh, I’m sorry, it was intelligence committees, let me correct that–not intelligence community, and then executive branch appointees. This creates the basis, and the potential for massive blackmail. Tice: Absolutely! And remember we talked about that before, that I was worried that the intelligence community now has sway over what is going on. Now here’s the big one. I haven’t given you any names. This was is summer of 2004. One of the papers that I held in my hand was to wiretap a bunch of numbers associated with, with a 40-something-year-old wannabe senator from Illinois. You wouldn’t happen to know where that guy lives right now, would you? It’s a big white house in Washington, DC. That’s who they went after. And that’s the president of the United States now. br> (Tice gave additional details to PBS. Videos here.) Other whistleblowers say the same thing. When the former head of the NSA’s digital spying program – William Binney – disclosed the fact that the U.S. was spying on everyone in the U.S. and storing the data forever, and that the U.S. was quickly becoming a totalitarian state, the Feds tried to scare him into shutting up: [Numerous] FBI officers held a gun to Binney’s head as he stepped naked from the shower. He watched with his wife and youngest son as the FBI ransacked their home. Later Binney was separated from the rest of his family, and FBI officials pressured him to implicate one of the other complainants in criminal activity. During the raid, Binney attempted to report to FBI officials the crimes he had witnessed at NSA, in particular the NSA’s violation of the constitutional rights of all Americans. However, the FBI wasn’t interested in these disclosures. Instead, FBI officials seized Binney’s private computer, which to this day has not been returned despite the fact that he has not been charged with a crime. Other NSA whistleblowers have also been subjected to armed raids and criminal prosecution. After high-level CIA officer John Kiriakou blew the whistle on illegal CIA torture, the government prosecuted him for espionage. Even the head of the CIA was targeted with extra-constitutional spying and driven out of office. Indeed, Binney makes it very clear that the government will use information gained from its all-pervasive spying program to frame anyone it doesn’t like. (More examples here.) Retired high-level CIA analyst Ray McGovern – the top CIA briefer to numerous presidents – said this a few weeks ago on a radio program: Which leads to the question, why would [Obama] do all these things? Why would he be afraid for example, to take the drones away from the CIA? Well, I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s afraid. Number one, he’s afraid of what happened to Martin Luther King Jr. And I know from a good friend who was there when it happened, that at a small dinner with progressive supporters – after these progressive supporters were banging on Obama before the election, “Why don’t you do the things we thought you stood for?” Obama turned sharply and said, “Don’t you remember what happened to Martin Luther King Jr.?” That’s a quote, and that’s a very revealing quote. McGovern also said: In a speech on March 21, second-term Obama gave us a big clue regarding his concept of leadership – one that is marked primarily by political risk-avoidance and a penchant for “leading from behind”: “Speaking as a politician, I can promise you this: political leaders will not take risks if the people do not demand that they do. You must create the change that you want to see.” John Kennedy was willing to take huge risks in reaching out to the USSR and ending the war in Vietnam. That willingness to take risks may have gotten him assassinated, as James Douglass argues in his masterful JFK and the Unspeakable. Martin Luther King, Jr., also took great risks and met the same end. There is more than just surmise that this weighs heavily on Barack Obama’s mind. Last year, pressed by progressive donors at a dinner party to act more like the progressive they thought he was, Obama responded sharply, “Don’t you remember what happened to Dr. King?” We’re agnostic about McGovern’s theory. We don’t know whether Obama is a total corrupt sell-out … or a chicken. We don’t think it matters … as the effect is the same.
Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Nigel Farage: "There is no confusion. Anybody who legally came to Britain will be allowed to remain" UKIP leader Nigel Farage has dismissed claims his party backs deporting existing EU migrants amid a row over comments made by its candidate in the Rochester and Strood by-election. Mark Reckless suggested existing EU migrants would only be allowed to remain in the UK for "a transitional period" should the UK quit the EU. But Mr Farage insisted UKIP respected the "rule of law and British justice". And he downplayed the comments as a "minor cause for confusion". Mr Farage insisted the by-election, in which his party is seeking to get its second Westminster MP elected, was being fought on UKIP's terms and the issue of immigration would "dominate" next year's general election campaign. Election hustings The row was sparked when former Conservative Mr Reckless was asked - at a televised hustings broadcast by ITV's Meridian - what would happen to EU migrants already living and working in Britain if the UK chose to leave the EU in a future referendum. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Mark Reckless's comments at the hustings sparked the row He suggested they would be looked at "sympathetically" but should only be allowed to remain in the UK for "a fixed period". Asked later on BBC Radio Kent if he was suggesting they should be deported, he said: "No I was not suggesting that." Mr Reckless said EU citizens in the UK legally at the time the country left the EU would be able to stay in the country and accused Conservative critics of "twisting" his words. 'Hectic campaign' Mr Farage told the BBC his colleague had been referring to the negotiations that would take place during a "transitional period" between a hypothetical vote to leave the EU and the actual moment of withdrawal. "When we invoke Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty which sets us off on a two-year negotiation to leave the EU, part of that renegotiations is what happens to retired people from Britain living on the Costa del Sol and what happens to people from Warsaw living in London," Mr Farage said. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Mark Reckless says he wants an "Australian-style, points-based system" of immigration "Let me make this clear, during our divorce negotiations, even if the EU was to behave badly and say [British] people living in Spain were to be threatened with not being there, we would maintain the line that we believe in the rule of law, we believe in British justice and we believe that anyone who has come to Britain legally has the right to remain." Asked if Mr Reckless did not know UKIP policy, Mr Farage said the campaign had been "long and hectic" and candidates in that situation often "got into a mode" of answering "on the topic and not the specific wording of the question". 'Mask slips' But Conservative MP Damian Green said Mr Reckless had come "dangerously close" to advocating a repatriation policy while Labour's Yvette Cooper said Mr Reckless had "let the mask slip". She said using the "language of repatriation" was "a policy that comes straight out of the last BNP manifesto and does not reflect British values". Image copyright Conservative Party Image caption Election leaflet issued by the Conservatives In a separate row on the last day of campaigning in the constituency, Mr Reckless accused the Conservative candidate Kelly Tolhurst of issuing a leaflet he described as "BNP-light" in its comments on immigration. Ms Tolhurst told the BBC that Mr Reckless's claim was a "lie", and said she was disappointed at the misrepresentation of her views. The paragraph of the leaflet in question reads: "Most people I know here have worked hard all their life, played by the rules and paid their fair share. But we sometimes struggle to access some of the services we need because of uncontrolled immigration. Others don't feel safe walking down the high street of our town. And those who are most vulnerable are being let down by a hospital that needs to do better." Ms Tolhurst then begins a new paragraph outlining her six-point program focusing on issues including immigration, health, crime, housing, and jobs. BBC political editor Nick Robinson said the controversy today stems from the fact that UKIP are now facing the same sort of scrutiny as the established Westminster parties - scrutiny "that is not always comfortable". The Rochester and Strood by-election takes place on Thursday. Polling stations will be open from 07:00 GMT to 22:00 GMT. The full list of candidates, in alphabetical order by surname, is: Barker, Mike - Independent Challis, Christopher - Independent Davidson, Hairy Knorm - Official Monster Raving Loony Party Fransen, Jayda - Britain First Goldsbrough, Stephen William - Independent Gregory, Clive - Green Party Juby, Geoff - Liberal Democrats Khan, Naushabah - Labour Long, Nick - People Before Profit Osborn, Dave - Patriotic Socialist Party Reckless, Mark - UK Independence Party Rose, Charlotte - Independent Tolhurst, Kelly - Conservative
NIAGARA FALLS - The owners of Community Beer Works plan to open a craft brewing tavern next summer on Niagara Street where they'll brew at least 1,550 gallons a year. The Community Beer Works tavern at 324 Niagara will become the first brewery in Niagara Falls in the past 75 years, said Mayor Paul A. Dyster. The $1.5 million investment by Community Beer Works and partners Buffalove Development and the Savarino Companies into the three-story, 4,300-square foot building was hailed as a sign of life in the city's struggling 300 block of Niagara Street, which once was lined with bars, but has more recently been a sign of the blight and decay that has plagued the City of Niagara Falls. Community Beer Works plans to utilize all three floors of the building that housed the long-shuttered Press Box tavern. The company plans a first-floor tavern with interior and exterior seating to highlight the brewing equipment. A second floor will feature a gaming area equipped with an arcade, billiards, rolle bolle. The third floor will have meeting space. Investor Sam Savarino said there will be a beer garden in front. The project is expected to employ nine full-time and nine part-time employees. Savarino said it was a risky investment, but "was a chance to do something that is funky, neat and what we think will be successful." He said it is their hope that the craft beer tarvern will bring people out of the hotels and also tie into the development that has been growing on the adjacent Third Street, where there are brand-new restaurants and the new public art space - Art Alley. "They've rounded a corner over there," said Savarino. He joked that after the third or fourth beer the investment made even more sense. Ethan Cox, president and co-owner of Community Beer Works, said the company's brews are attracting a growing following. The company has another pub at 15 Lafayette Ave. in Buffalo, but it also distributes kegs to 150 to 200 accounts in Buffalo and the surrounding area. Some of the flagship brews are their pale ale called, "Frank," a brown ale called "The Whale" and an IPA called "That IPA." The brewery also plans to offer a Niagara Falls-themed brew in the future. Cox said they will brew each year at least 50 barrels a year of their craft brew at the Niagara site, which will be supplemented with beer from their production facility. Cox called Third Street in Niagara Falls the next Elmwood Avenue and said he feels the Community Beer Works tavern can have a role in this continued effort to create a walkable community. "Beer brings people together," said Cox. Bernice Radle, the president of Buffalove Development, was born and raised in Niagara Falls and raised her hands excitedly to announced her return to her hometown with the new investment. She said she promised her family she'd return to invest in Niagara Falls when she got her footing. Radle said Buffalove Development is a mission-driven, small scale development company involved in the historic preservation of buildings like the one at 324 Niagara St. "For us to bring what we have been doing in Buffalo to Niagara Falls - my hometown - I'm really, really thrilled about it," said Radle. Dyster said in addition to tourists looking for craft beers, there is also a ready-made customer base as more young people are moving into Niagara Falls. Anthony Vilardo, director of business development for Niagara Falls said the city took ownership of the Niagara Street bar for back taxes in 2009. Instead of auctioning the property, Vilardo said the city asked for requests for proposals, and chose Community Beer Works as the best private sector investment. "What we are proposing is an investment in Niagara Street and we are hoping that investment pays off," said Savarino.
SHANGHAI, June 10 (Reuters) - China’s top economic planner said it had given the green light to over 120 billion yuan ($19.34 billion) worth of airport and railway projects, the latest slew of infrastructure approvals as Beijing looks to avert a sharp slowdown in the economy. China’s National Development and Reform Commission said on its website on Wednesday it had approved seven projects, including the 14.5 billion yuan expansion of an airport on the holiday island of Hainan and a 691 million yuan airport in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang. Two of the seven approvals were for railway projects, among them a 96.1 billion yuan track connecting Hefei, the capital of Anhui province, to the eastern coastal city of Hangzhou. Four of the projects were given the green light in April and May with the rest were approved last week, according to the NDRC. China’s economy grew at its weakest pace in six years in the first quarter, expanding 7 percent, weighed down by a cooling housing market, slowing local investment and weak domestic and foreign demand. Economists at China’s central bank on Tuesday shaved their forecast for China’s economic growth to 7.0 percent for 2015, from 7.1 percent previously. In mid-May, China approved close to 250 billion yuan of railway subway projects. ($1 = 6.2055 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Brenda Goh; Editing by Kazunori Takada)
The Security Cabinet unanimously approved the establishment of a new settlement for the former residents of Amona, an illegally constructed outpost in the West Bank that was evacuated in February. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter Following the Security Cabinet’s decision, other government ministers were contacted by telephone to obtain their approval for the plan. This is the first time in 20 years that the government has decided to establish a new settlement. The new settlement is to be established in the Shiloh Valley. Last month, would-be inhabitants of a hilltop location there, Geulat Zion—which, like Amona, is illegal—made a point of rejecting Amona residents’ moving to the area. Protestors at Amona evacuation (Photo: AFP) The former residents of Amona had been growing anxious regarding their housing istuation. They had released a statement earlier in the day saying, “We demand that the prime minister and the rest of the government unanimously support the establishment of a new settlement… at the site chosen by the residents.” The statement added that the residents would not accept or cooperate with plans to resettle the community as part of a new neighborhood of an existing settlement. “You destroyed our homes. Now build new ones. You signed an agreement stating that by March 31 work would begin on a new community. Fulfill that agreement,” the residents said. Later in the day, the former residents’ tone changed upon being informed of the new settlement, which they welcomed. They released a new statement that announced, “The memory of the Amona settlement will always remain in our hearts. We love you, Homeland, so we swear on this day to return to the land of Amona—us, and if not us, our sons who will rise after us—one never leaves a homeland. “However, from the time when Amona was destroyed, we asked only one thing: a pioneering-Zionist mission to establish a new settlement in the Land of Israel, for us and for the entire People of Israel. Only creating a reach life of prosperity of action will serve as a cure for our pain and the pain of the public for a life that was taken.” TPS contributed to this report. http://tpsnews.co.il/
The Houston Rockets are approaching the upcoming trade deadline with the intent to keep center Dwight Howard for the rest of the season, according to sources familiar with the team's plans. Sources told ESPN.com on Wednesday that the Rockets, despite recent speculation to the contrary‎, are not looking to trade Howard before the Feb. 18 deadline even though he has the right to become a free agent July 1 and could thus leave the team this summer without receiving anything in return. The Rockets' grand plan, sources said this week, remains making an all-out pursuit in free agency this summer for Oklahoma City Thunder star Kevin Durant. Rockets officials have long believed privately that they will have as good a chance as any team to lure Durant away from the Thunder in the offseason because of his strong relationship with former teammate James Harden and the room Houston has to pay Durant max-contract money while also re-signing Howard. Sources said Howard, for his part, does not want to be traded and hopes he can indeed finish the season in Houston before entering into his own negotiations with the Rockets. Dwight Howard is in the Rockets' plans and not on the trading block, according to sources. Bart Young/NBAE/Getty Images Although the Rockets' aggressive nature on the trade market will undoubtedly lead some rival teams to believe that their stance could still change during the final two weeks before the trade deadline, one source insisted Wednesday that the Rockets haven't held any meaningful trade talks involving Howard since December. Reports surfaced earlier Wednesday in both the New York Daily News and from Comcast Sports New England about the Boston Celtics having interest in trading for Howard. "I didn't say it, what can I do," Howard said after Wednesday's practice when asked about the reports. "There is nothing I can say. Teams are going to say what they have to say. I don't know." Howard, 30, is averaging 14.4 points and 11.8 rebounds this season, but he has been limited to 40 games by injuries (ankle and a sore back) and two suspensions. Over the past 20 games, however, his offensive production has increased to 16.2 points per game. Howard is earning $22.4 million this season but is expected to bypass the $23.3 million he's scheduled to earn in 2016-17 to become a free agent July 1 along with Durant. "Nobody talks about that stuff," Howard said. "My mind is on trying to get better every day, and I felt like I was on a good stretch and got hurt. Just trying to get back, that's my mindset. We don't sit around and talk about, 'Hey what's going to happen next year?' Because that means you're really not in, and you don't want to have those thoughts."
Keith Leslie, The Canadian Press TORONTO -- Ontario's Liberal government announced Friday it would provide a $120-million grant to Waterloo-based Open Text Corp. (TSX:OTC), Canada's largest software company. Premier Kathleen Wynne said the grant will help create as many as 1,200 "well paying" jobs as Open Text invests $2 billion to expand its operations in Toronto, Peterborough, Kingston, Ottawa and Waterloo over the next seven years. The investment by Open Text will bolster Ontario's position as North America's second biggest centre for information and communications technology, behind California and ahead of Texas, Wynne added after touring the company's facilities in Waterloo. "This investment is a terrific example of how government can partner with business to help create jobs and grow the economy," she said. "This is an investment in the future of the company. It's an investment in the future of the jobs and the people who are going to have jobs here, and it's an investment in the future of the province of Ontario." Open Text, which started as a technology spin-off from the University of Waterloo in 1991 with four employees, now has more than 8,000 workers worldwide. The company reported Thursday that net earnings for the three months ended March 31 soared to $45.8 million, or 33 cents per share, as revenue rose to $442.8 million. Over the past seven years, annual revenues at Open Text have grown nearly 130 per cent to $1.36 billion. Shares of the company have strengthened as well, rising more than 160 per cent over the past five years. "We are an Ontario-grown global company and we chose to invest here because of the highly educated workforce, our strong university partnerships in R-&-D, as well as the province's robust and innovative start-up communities," said Open Text president and CEO Mark Barrenechea. Getting provincial money was a key factor in the company's decision to expand in Ontario, added Barrenechea. Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak said he would stop giving money to corporations and instead would cut taxes for all businesses, not just big companies with well connected lobbyists. "So let's replace the handout business, the $2 billion in corporate welfare, and use that money to give lower and fair taxes for all businesses to succeed," Hudak said at a Toronto factory. "Small, medium-sized businesses don't get the handouts, they get stuck with the bill." But Wynne rejected Hudak's criticism and said it is the government's duty to team up with businesses like Open Text to ensure jobs are created and the economy keeps growing. "We are proud to support its continued growth here in the province," she said. Last December, Wynne announced Ontario was giving another IT giant, Cisco Canada, $220 million to help create up to 1,700 new jobs in the province. Economic Development Minister Eric Hoskins said companies like Cisco and Open Text are "courted daily by presidents and senators" who want investments and jobs in their communities, so he "aggressively" pursued Open Text when he heard they were looking to expand. "Unlike the Conservatives, who would have us stand aside when these opportunities come up, we believe that we do need to compete," Hoskins said in an interview. "When you've got a world class firm such as Open Text making a significant, $2 billion investment -- where they can make that in any one of the 33 countries where they have a presence -- we wanted them to make it here in Ontario." Ontario gets more than 90 per cent of its foreign investment without using taxpayers' money as an incentive, but the Liberal government is looking to partner with companies to attract more investment capital, especially with high-growth firms like Open Text, added Hoskins. "We feel that it's important in terms of not just job growth, but also strengthening and anchoring even further that great high-tech cluster that we've got in the province," he said. "This was an investment worth making." Open Text sells software and data management technology used by companies to protect their electronic documents. It has been rapidly expanding over the past few years with the acquisition of several companies involved in e-learning. "We're equally optimistic about the future that we'll continue to grow," Barrenechea said in an interview. "We're putting our multi-year plans in place right now and making choices where we want to continue to establish ourselves. It's important to have a public-private partnership to help make those choices." With files from David Friend
The GLXP competition, which started in 2007, aims to kick off a new era of space exploration by enabling low-cost and efficient access to the moon. Not only is the moon our closest neighbor in space, it’s also the gateway to exploring the rest of the universe—and provides opportunities for discovery in the fields of science, technology, and human habitation. The teams in the competition come from all walks of life, from Silicon Valley tech experts, to hackers in Germany, to IT specialists in India, to a father and son working out of their their Vancouver apartment. In a series of 9 digital documentaries, Moon Shotgoes behind the scenes with each team, bringing to life their challenges, sacrifices, quirks, and most importantly, the reasons why they’re making the 238,900 mile journey to the moon. The series will be available for free on Google Play on March 15 and on YouTube on March 17. Subscribe to the Google Lunar XPRIZE YouTube Channel to be one of the first to see it, and for more information, visit lunar.xprize.org.
I’m not sure why I do what I do. Most of my life is on autopilot. Words and gestures comes to me without thought, and I rarely question them after they happen. The purposes which lie underneath the words and gestures are subtle, even to me, and I can only recognize them looking back. “Hi,” I say to my friend who’s working on computer code in his room. I stop outside his room so he knows I’m talking to him, and I face him so he knows I’m interested in his reply. “How’d you sleep?” “Good,” he says back, turning away from his computer in a way that lets me know that his attention is now on me, and no longer on his work. “I had a weird dream last night, though.” “Oh, did you?” I say. I say it in a tone and manner that implies slight curiosity, giving him an excuse to tell me about if he’d like to but making it clear that I don’t actually care that much. “Yeah,” he says, “really strange.” It looks as if he considers telling me about the dream, then he realizes that, despite his desire to tell me, he realizes it would be an unfair imposition to tell me if I don’t have particular interest. “Cool,” I say, even though I don’t think it actually is. “I’m going out to lunch, would you like to join me?” This is a good gesture. Not only does it let him know that I wish to spend more time with him, which is nice of me, but it also lets him know that I’m considering his hunger and his possible desire for friendly companionship. “No, I’m good. I have a sandwich in the fridge. Thank you, though.” This ends our social interaction. “Bye,” I say, to confirm the end of the social interaction, and walk away. Of course, none of this actually goes through my mind during this brief interaction. As I said, I run on autopilot, and all of these social skills and norms are so engrained in me that I have to pay attention to notice them. But sometimes I do notice them, usually when a social situation deviates from the norm. If I make a joke and the other person doesn’t laugh but seems upset or panicked, I’ll worry over the joke. I’ll attempt to fix my mistake in that conversation, I’ll inquire obliquely about why they didn’t appreciate the joke. If that doesn’t work, I might worry about the miffed social interaction for hours afterwards, turning over in my head how I meant the joke versus how they might have taken it. I have to try to enter their head, see how they view the world, walk in their shoes. Of course, that’s the basic problem. I can only analyze how they might have taken it through the way I might have felt about it. There’s no rulebook about social interactions, at least none that covers anything more than generalities. Social interactions are entirely implicit, governed by culturally-specific, occasionally stringent rules that are only rarely laid out. We have to learn them through experience and generally without anyone specifically teaching us. It’s strange to have to think about social interactions normal to us from another’s perspective. Online, I found a guide to European visitors on how to handle social interactions in America. It warned Europeans that Americans often use “How are you?” as a greeting rather than an interrogative, that an answer isn’t always expected. Which is true, but something that I never thought about. I just incorporated it into my daily interactions, assimilated it like I did so many other context-specific phrases and words. It made me wonder, however, how many Europeans I’ve confused over my life by saying “How are you?” in passing, walking away while they hurriedly tried to come up with an answer. And, on the flip side, it made me wonder how many social interactions I’ve misunderstood, how many gestures I’ve misinterpreted. I’m reminded of my brother making a joke about his 9th grade teacher being fat to his 9th grade English teacher, then being shocked when she wrote him up. “But she laughed!” he protested. “How could she have been mad if she laughed?” My brother had learned laughter was a positive thing, that a joke went over well if the recipient laughed. He hadn’t yet learned that for some people, laughing and snarling could be practically interchangeable. So how do we learn these things? My brother learned his lesson by being forced to write an essay about how the simile “My teacher is overweight like an overstuffed pillow” is inappropriate. Interestingly, the explicit lesson taught by his English teacher was only that commenting on a woman’s weight is inappropriate, which is a cultural norm only true in cultures where women are encouraged to be thin. The more subtle and perhaps universal underlying lesson, that laughter is not always an encouragement, was one that had to be inferred. This makes me think that human beings must have an innate ability to infer from specific circumstances to universal rules. If you train a dog not to jump up on the kitchen table and eat your dinner, he will only infer that to your specific kitchen table (as I can attest from experience, having lost an entire roast duck to a Labrador Retriever). However, young kids must infer that, for instance, they must use cutlery at every kitchen table, that if it is inappropriate to eat steak with your hands at your own house, then it is inappropriate to pick up a fish cutlet at your aunt’s house. Of course the ability to make these inferences is not equal among all people, especially if the signals are more subtle. Hence the existence of “charmers”, “ladies’ men”, and all others renowned for their social skills. There are many social interactions to successfully navigate in order to successfully romance a woman or close a business deal, and the existence of well-attended, expensive seminars to accomplish both of these objectives suggests the difficulty of navigating each social interaction successfully. So the next time you see someone in the street, and say “Hi!” or wave or ask them how their day was, think of why you’re doing it, and what you are expecting to get out of it. Ask yourself what your purpose was, and if the same purpose could be accomplished in a different way. Until then, I’m going to have to finish this essay and say goodbye to you, dear reader. In this manner, I’ve made a somewhat artificial connection with you, complimented you, and hopefully established a relationship which will keep you coming back to my writings. In this manner, I also close this interaction, and therefore free myself to move on with my day. Advertisements
The diner was go-to spot for delicious greasy food for more than 30 years before in closed in 2014. Sarah Jordan, an award-winning pastry chef, reopened the diner in 2015. View Full Caption DNAinfo/Josh McGhee LOGAN SQUARE — Johnny's Grill and Mezclaeria Las Flores — two of the most prominent establishments on the square — are closing, ownership announced Friday afternoon. The last day for both the diner and the adjoining bar is Friday, according to an Instagram post. "Friends, it is with a heavy heart and great sadness to share with you that Johnny's Grill and Mezcaleria Las Flores will be closing after service next Friday, November 3rd," the post reads. The post continues, "A big thank you to everyone involved in both places from the beginning, especially our fearless and talented leader Chef Sarah Jordan. We can't thank her enough for all of the heart and soul that she put into every last bite. While we are saddened, we hope you'll come say goodbye in the next few days and have a mezcal cocktail and a double cheeseburger. Thank you for the memories." The longtime diner at 2545 N. Kedzie Blvd. closed in 2014 after more than 30 years of business. In August 2015, Jordan, an award-winning pastry chef who previously worked at Boka and Cicchetti, reopened the diner and an adjoining mezcal bar in the former Fleur flower shop. It's unclear what prompted the closure. Neither Jordan nor Saul Osacky, owner of the building and the Logan Square Auditorium, immediately returned messages Friday afternoon.
Image copyright PA Jeremy Corbyn has said Theresa May's call for rival parties to contribute their policy ideas showed the government "has run out of steam". He said he was happy to give the PM a copy of his party's manifesto, adding, "or better still an early election so the people of this country can decide". Mrs May will use a speech on Tuesday to call on parties to "contribute and not just criticise". She says there are a range of issues on which MPs from different parties agree. First Secretary of State Damian Green described the post-election change in Mrs May's style of government as a "grown-up way of doing politics". But Mr Corbyn used the PM's Commons statement on the weekend G20 summit in Hamburg to claim it showed "weakness from this government". "The government is apparently asking other parties for their policy ideas," he said. Turning to the prime minister, he said: "If you would like it, I'm very happy to furnish you with a copy of our manifesto or better still, an early election so the people in this county can decide. "Let's face it, the government has run out of steam at a pivotal time in our county and the world around uncertainty over Brexit, conflict in the Gulf states, nuclear sabre-rattling in North Korea, refugees continuing to flee war and destruction, ongoing pandemics, cross-border terrorism, poverty and inequality and the impact of climate change are the core global challenges of our time. "Just when we need strong government, we have weakness from this government." Analysis By BBC political correspondent Chris Mason Theresa May's speech is a pitch for cross-party consensus. "Come forward with your own views and ideas about how we can tackle" the challenges the country faces, Mrs May will say, adding: "We may not agree on everything, but ideas can be clarified and improved and a better way forward found." Bluntly, it is an explicit acknowledgement of her fragility; her authority and majority shrivelled. Government sources say it is a mature approach that maintains a commitment to taking on big, difficult and complex challenges; not just Brexit but reform of social care, too, for instance. Labour says Mrs May's speech proves the Conservatives have "completely run out of ideas" and were reduced to "begging" for policy proposals from them. But Mrs May insisted the government had "an ambitious agenda to change this country", adding that there were many issues on which she "would hope we would be able to achieve consensus across this House", such as police and security agencies having the powers they need to deal with the terrorist threats they face. The exchanges came ahead of Mrs May's speech which will return to the message from her first day in Downing street last July, when she succeeded David Cameron, and vowed to lead what she called a "one nation" government that works for all and not just the "privileged few". The speech is being seen by some as a "re-launch" or "fightback" after Mrs May lost her majority - and much of her authority - in the snap election last month. In her speech, the PM will say that although the result of June's election was not what she wanted, "those defining beliefs remain, my commitment to change in Britain is undimmed". She will unveil a review - of casual and low-paid work - by Matthew Taylor, a former top adviser to Tony Blair, which she commissioned when she became prime minister. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption Theresa May met her Australian counterpart Malcolm Turnbull in Downing Street It is thought Mr Taylor, who has been examining the use of zero-hours contracts and the rise in app-based firms such as Uber and Deliveroo, will stop short of calling for a compulsory minimum wage for those employed in the so-called gig economy, who do not have guaranteed hours or pay rates. But he is expected to propose a series of extra rights for those in insecure jobs and could also recommend shaking up the tax system to reduce the gap between employees and the self-employed. He is also likely to call for measures to improve job satisfaction for people working in minimum wage jobs, according to The Guardian. Media playback is unsupported on your device Media caption The PM has a programme for Britain that will spread prosperity, the first secretary of state tells Today Speaking at a press conference with Australian counterpart Malcolm Turnbull on Monday, Mrs May said she had sought input from other parties in the past on issues like counter-terrorism and modern slavery. She also said she was happy to work with Labour's Yvette Cooper and others in a cross-party approach to tackling intimidation and online abuse of MPs and others involved in the political process. Asked if her desire for co-operation extended to Brexit, including on the government's Repeal Bill when it is published later this week, the prime minister said she was seeking the "broadest possible consensus" surrounding the terms of the UK's exit. Image copyright PA Image caption Damian Green: This is a grown up way of doing politics Lib Dem Brexit spokesman Tom Brake said: "A call for Labour to contribute is superfluous. On the single biggest issue of our generation, Brexit, Corbyn isn't contributing, he is cheerleading." Scottish Government Brexit minister Michael Russell said: "If the prime minister is genuinely interested in creating a consensus then Scotland should have a seat at the negotiations to leave the EU." But Mr Green, who has known Mrs May since university and is effectively her deputy prime minister, said the public would welcome a move away from politics in which parties "just sit in the trenches and shell each other". The BBC's assistant political editor, Norman Smith, said that the Conservatives and Labour were "poles apart" on many significant policy areas. He told BBC Radio 4's The World at One: "More brutally, Jeremy Corbyn is not minded to help Theresa May. He smells blood in the water. "He wants to do everything he can to stampede Mrs May into another election, so the idea he might somehow seek to cooperate with her, I think, is bordering on the fanciful." Get news from the BBC in your inbox, each weekday morning
Far-right radio host Michael Savage was incensed yesterday by the Secretary of the Air Force’s recent comments suggesting that transgender military service members “will be allowed to serve in a more open way” within “the next few months.” Savage said that a review of the military’s policy on transgender service members will cause the armed forces to ignore the needs of the troops, and is just another sign that America is witnessing “the meltdown of our culture under Barry Hussein Obama like you could never imagine.” “Think of your most radical, crazy professor,” Savage said. “Think of the nuttiest, the most stupid professor you’ve ever had, totally locked into the left-wing shibboleths of the time, and you learn to listen to it in order to just get through the course. Now take that professor, put the professor into the presidency, give him all the power in the world and let that professor take all the power it can because of a supine Congress and a nonexistent press, and now you know what’s going on in America. We have an out-of-control, lunatic, left-wing college teacher running the country.” “That’s why we need the antidote,” he continued. “The antidote to this toxic snake poison is Donald Trump. Trump is the antidote to the Hussein snake poison.” As we’ve previously noted, Savage “believes that God is lifting Trump to victory, hailing the candidate as ‘the Winston Churchill of our time‘ and hoping that he will become a dictator who rules by decree and stop Obama before he begins arresting and killing Americans en masse.”
Creston Plaza Apartments redevelopment project 02 Creston Plaza Apartments, as seen Friday, Nov. 6, 2015, were rebuilt by the Grand Rapids Housing Commission for 100 families. They were built in the three years that have passed since the last time the commission was able to open its wait list for Section 8 vouchers. (Cory Morse \| MLive.com) GRAND RAPIDS, MI - For the first time in three years, the Grand Rapids Housing Commission will be opening up its waiting list for Section 8 housing vouchers as of Monday, June 19. Officials are expecting about 10,000 people to apply for 5,000 available spots on the waiting list, said Carlos Sanchez, executive director of the Housing Commission. Section 8 vouchers are in high demand and provide a subsidy to low-income households who are renting from private landlords. The Housing Commission is currently awarding vouchers to people who have been on a waiting list since May 2014. Due to the limited availability of spots, officials will be holding a lottery to determine placement on the waiting list. "If you're on the top of the list it will be a matter of months, but if you're on the bottom it will be years," Sanchez said of wait times for a voucher. "It's really bad. People are desperate for getting assistance." People can apply to be on the wait list from midnight, June 19, to 11:59 p.m. June 30. Applications can only be made online at www.GRHClist.org or over the phone by calling 616-235-2622. Applicants should have their Social Security numbers ready, as well as their income information, when they apply. Paper applications will not be provided, and people cannot apply in the Housing Commission office due to the high interest in the vouchers. Sanchez said the commission is taking deliberate steps to avoid having applicants spend long hours waiting outside in a line outside their office. The Housing Commission will then conduct a lottery to see which of the applicants make the 5,000 spots on the waiting list. A computerized random system will determine ranking on the list. Applicants can check the status of their application at grhc.apply4housing.com/status. Being on the waiting list doesn't guarantee a Section 8 voucher. A full application must be processed after landing on the wait list to determine eligibility. The commission has 3,290 vouchers to offer on an annual basis under the set amount of funding it is allocated from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Sanchez said the Grand Rapids Housing Commission has had the same number of Section 8 vouchers to offer for at least the past seven years. "The market in Grand Rapids is really tight," Sanchez said. "The Section 8 helps a lot of families so they can increase their income over time." The vouchers are in high demand, both in Grand Rapids and across the nation. Grand Rapids residents will receive preference in the lottery selection. "We'll get applications from all over the country," Sanchez said. "People are trying to get on any waiting list." After last filling its 5,000-person waiting list for Section 8 vouchers in 2014, the Housing Commission has been slowly working through the list by turning over 20 to 30 units a month. The waiting list is sitting at 150 applicants, which Sanchez expects will be approved for a voucher in the next three to four months. To eliminate lag time, the commission wants to fill up the waiting list now. Demand continues to exceed supply for subsidized housing in Grand Rapids. When the Housing Commission opened the new Creston Plaza apartments in 2015, 5,000 applications came in. And in 2007 when the new, 92-unit Campau Commons apartments opened, 8,000 applications were handed in.
ATLANTA, GA - OCTOBER 20: Head coach Greg Schiano of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers looks on prior to the game against the Atlanta Falcons at Georgia Dome on October 20, 2013 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images) (Photo by Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images) Before the Buccaneers dropped to 0-6 on the season by losing 31-23 to the Atlanta Falcons, Bucs Super Bowl MVP Dexter Jackson got in-depth on Greg Schiano’s character during “Game Day Uncensored” heard before kickoff on 98.7 The Fan. Jackson started by getting into detail of the players and assistant coaches fearing their head coach before saying that he was almost among them. “I even tried to get a job there (at One Buc Place),” former Super Bowl MVP Dexter Jackson said on 98.7 The Fan Sunday morning. “Some people said, ‘be careful man, you don’t want to work here’ and I was like ‘wow, I’m a Buccaneer,’ and people have been telling me to be careful.” Dexter Jackson has known people within the walls of One Buc Place since the day he was drafted out of Florida State University in 1999 during the 4th round. Jackson has tried to stay close with the organization over the years which has included attending practices. Under Schiano, this came to an end. “Schiano sent his guy over to run me out of practice one day,” Dexter Jackson said. “This guy said, ‘Who are you? What are you doing here? You can’t be here.’ I said, ‘go get the Glazers if you want me to leave.’ He (Schiano) tried to run me out.” The greatest organizations in sports embrace the greatness of their organization. Dexter Jackson was the MVP of Super Bowl XXXVII, the only Super Bowl appearance in Bucs history. I also find it interesting that Schiano sent “his guy” over to do his dirty work. One has to wonder what other dirty work “his guy” has done. Jackson wasn’t just trying to stay connected with the organization for himself, he was also trying to keep the children embraced by the football team that represents this city. “I usually bring kids to One Buc Place, 4th and 5th graders in Hillsborough County and Pinellas County doing my case management work with a lot of youth in this area,” Jackson said on 98.7 The Fan. “They told me to stop bringing kids on Friday because I’m distracting professional players.” “I’m distracting professional players by bringing kids who have succeeded in school, did well, stayed out of trouble, and they’re a distraction?” Jackson questioned the decision of the Buccaneers and Greg Schiano. “If they’re a distraction, I’m worried about fans during away games. How can that be a distraction?” These professional athletes make it to this level of football because of their talent and their mental toughness. How can the Buccaneers truly believe that a group of children will distract a team of professional athletes 48 hours before their game even starts? If your team can be distracted this easily by a group of elementary school kids 48 hours before kickoff, then you probably have a really weak team with zero mental discipline. The Buccaneers now sit 0-6 on the season without any visits from these children that Dexter Jackson wanted to bring. Could you imagine how bad this season would be if the children would have been allowed to go to One Buc Place? Jackson also discussed at length Sunday morning the amount of charity work his teams did during his days playing for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Jackson still does a lot for the community today. The current regime has failed at this aspect as well in Jackson’s eyes. “Have you ever seen Schiano in the community doing things,” Dexter Jackson asked. “What has Schiano brought to the city area, extended his hand to the community? What has he done?” I answered by reminding Dexter that Schiano did turn him and those kids away. “Yes he did,” Jackson responded. “I’m a bad influence.” Game Day Uncensored airs two hours before kickoff of every Tampa Bay Buccaneers game. Catch Game Day Uncensored this Thursday night at 6:00 on the corner of Tampa Bay and Himes outside of Raymond James Stadium.
More than 10 months after Adam Lanza massacred 26 students and faculty and committed suicide at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, questions still abound in the midst of conspiracy theories and prolonged speculation. The October 21 edition of The Hartford Courant, which has been following the story closely since the mass murder last December 14, ran an editorial complaining about State Attorney Stephen Sedensky's delay in releasing the full investigative report, originally expected by the end of June. In the meantime, says the Courant, details continue to leak, feeding "the sick conspiracy mill and prolong[ing] the pain." But the editorial admits Sedensky's stonewall is prompting a host of relevant questions. What have investigators found that prevents publication? Can investigators explain what prompted Adam Lanza's murderous actions? Along with the delayed report, other circumstances add to general mistrust. Why is the school building being demolished, access to the site closed to the public, and even photos and videos banned? The Courant continues: Also raising suspicions are the confidentiality agreements that workers at the elementary school are being required to sign. They are tearing down the school to make way for a new one, a move The Courant supports. But pledging workers to secrecy about what they see is excessive and unlikely to succeed. At this rate the school may be razed before the report is out. What if the document raises questions about the building? Then there is the subject of the 911 calls. On September 30, the Los Angeles Times reported that Sedensky is appealing the Connecticut Freedom of Information Commission's order to release the 911 recordings from the school shooting. Sedensky petitions for "sensitivity toward victims' families." Yet the Times notes, "The secrecy is striking in light of the quick release of information — from 911 recordings to pictures and video — in other notorious crimes." Perhaps most important are the results of Lanza's toxicology tests, conducted by the Connecticut medical examiner in the weeks after the shooting to check for the presence of drugs in his system. The medical examiner released Lanza's autopsy findings, which showed nothing of note, less than one month after the rampage, but what of the drug test results? In May, the Huffington Post reported that Lanza's toxicology tests showed no evidence of alcohol or drugs, illegal or prescription. However, the Post was not reporting official test results. Instead, this news was revealed by an "official close to the investigation" who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was "not authorized to publicly disclose the information." The report also stated that warrants revealed no evidence of drugs or medications at the Lanza home, though authorities found "medical, psychiatric and prescription records" there. Unsurprisingly, the contents of these documents remain undisclosed. However, it appears Huffington's source may have been mistaken. The parent advocacy group AbleChild has been battling for months to obtain Lanza's psychiatric drug history. During a recent Freedom of Information Act hearing in the case AbleChild vs. Chief Medical Examiner, Connecticut attorney Patrick B. Kwanashie argued against releasing the toxicology test records because they could "cause a lot of people to stop taking their medications — stop cooperating with their treating physicians just because of the heinousness of what Adam Lanza did." Kwanashie opined that AbleChild is requesting the information for illegitimate reasons. "Even if you can conclusively establish that Adam Lanza — his murderous actions — were caused by antidepressants, you can't logically from that conclude that you know others would commit the same actions as a result of taking antidepressants." On the contrary, AbleChild argues that release of the results will promote informed consent and public health. Patricia Weathers, co-founder of AbleChild, lamented, "This opposition comes despite the fact that 31 school shootings and/or school-related acts of violence have been committed by those taking or withdrawing from psychiatric drugs resulting in 162 wounded and 72 killed," with no federal investigation into the link between psychiatric drugs and such violence. If psychiatric drugs are indeed strongly linked to such violence, this could challenge the federal government's narrative that guns are the problem and more gun control is the solution. Perhaps this explains the stonewalling of the investigation. Photo of officials outside Sandy Hook Elementary school after the shooting on Dec. 14, 2012: AP Images
On Saturday Nov. 22, protesters associated with the animal rights activist organization Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) staged a demonstration inside and outside of Pig BBQ Joint in downtown Victoria. They held signs saying, “It’s not food, it’s violence,” and loudly asserted to customers that “what’s being served in this business is not food, it’s bodies.” The following Tuesday, a group led by local chef Morgan Onda bought lunch at Pig in a show of solidarity with the restaurant. Their response was a simple reversal of the protesters’ slogan, signs that read “It’s not violence, it’s food.” There is a legitimate debate over whether meat should be considered a basic food resource or a luxury. On the extreme end, those opposed to meat as a resource want to grant additional rights to non-human animals, comparable to the rights we have formulated for ourselves. Whatever people believe about animal rights, there is also plenty of weight to both sides of the argument over whether humans, being omnivorous creatures, should continue to include other animals in their diet when vegetarian options exist throughout most of the modern world. However, the value of ethical practices at all stages of meat production is far less ambiguous. Most would agree that corporate profit at the expense of causing senseless suffering in animals is wrong; one need only concede that animals can experience pain, and then take steps to prevent the same kind of excruciating deaths that they would meet in the wild. It seems reasonable that ethical meat production should actually allow livestock to have less painful lives and deaths than they would have in nature. Under natural conditions, prey animals generally either die of illness or old age with no palliative care or mercy whatsoever, or they fall into the rending claws and teeth of carnivores and omnivores less conscientious than humans. Humans are unique in the animal kingdom for our ability, at our best, to minimize the discomfort of whatever we kill. The only comparison I can think of is to the few predators whose venom happens to include an anaesthetic effect. By nature’s standards, we can be remarkably kind to our prey. It is strange that DxE chose to hold their demonstration at a local business that sources its meat from federally approved plants. Why not choose a more egregious example of cruel industrial practices, like one of the major fast food chains? Was it simply that the restaurant’s straightforward name, Pig, would garner more attention? Did they think that the restaurant’s patrons might be from demographics more inclined to change their minds on the meat issue in response to a debate? Why, then, did they resort to shouting slogans rather than engaging the customers in conversation or handing out informative literature? Does DxE consider it worthwhile to treat human beings with respect, during their efforts to convince humans to treat other animals with respect? At the very least, treating humans well is just as important as treating other animals well, if one believes that humans are at all similar to other animals. In order to respect any animal, one must provide a certain amount of physical and emotional comfort, but our species has a fundamental need for something more: intellectual integrity, the comfort of the truth. We like to communicate. We like to ask—and be asked—questions. I would challenge DxE and those like them to ask rational questions and satisfy others with more cogent responses, even if what mostly gets them noticed is their voices raised in anger. For example, they could write to the Martlet.
President Trump told Chinese President Xi Jinping about the missile strike on Syria over "the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake" during his Mar-a-Lago visit last week. Trump told Fox Business that he and Xi were eating dessert when he got the news that the strike was about to occur. "I was sitting at the table. We had finished dinner. We're now having dessert. And we had the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake that you've ever seen and President Xi was enjoying it," Trump said. "And I was given the message from the generals that the ships are locked and loaded, what do you do? And we made a determination to do it, so the missiles were on the way." "And I said, 'Mr. President, let me explain something to you.' This was during dessert. We've just fired 59 missiles, all of which hit, by the way, unbelievable, from, you know, hundreds of miles away, all of which hit, amazing." Trump said Xi was silent upon hearing the news but appeared to have a positive response to the strike. .@POTUS tells @MariaBartiromo he told President Xi about the Missile strikes over "the most beautiful piece of chocolate cake." pic.twitter.com/vPLu7ZhxbR— FOX Business (@FoxBusiness) April 12, 2017 "We're almost finished and I — what does he do, finish his dessert and go home and then they say, you know, the guy you just had dinner with just attacked a country?" Trump said. He added, "He paused for 10 seconds and then he asked the interpreter to please say it again. I didn't think that was a good sign. And he said to me, anybody that uses gases — you could almost say or anything else — but anybody that was so brutal and uses gases to do that young children and babies, it's OK." The Pentagon on Tuesday clarified that 57 of the 59 cruise missiles hit their targets at the Shayrat airfield in Syria. Trump also cited the "genius" of military equipment and the need to increase funding. "It's so incredible. It's brilliant. It's genius. Our technology, our equipment, is better than anybody by a factor of five," Trump said. "I mean look, we have, in terms of technology, nobody can even come close to competing. "Now we're going to start getting it, because, you know, the military has been cut back and depleted so badly by the past administration and by the war in Iraq, which was another disaster," he said.
This article is about the fact that the Earth is spherical and its history. For the measurement, see Earth's circumference The earliest reliably documented mention of the spherical Earth concept dates from around the 6th century BC when it appeared in ancient Greek philosophy,[1][2] but remained a matter of speculation until the 3rd century BC, when Hellenistic astronomy established the spherical shape of the Earth as a physical given and calculated Earth's circumference. The paradigm was gradually adopted throughout the Old World during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages.[3][4][5][6] A practical demonstration of Earth's sphericity was achieved by Ferdinand Magellan and Juan Sebastián Elcano's expedition's circumnavigation (1519–1522).[7] The concept of a spherical Earth displaced earlier beliefs in a flat Earth: In early Mesopotamian mythology, the world was portrayed as a flat disk floating in the ocean with a hemispherical sky-dome above,[8] and this forms the premise for early world maps like those of Anaximander and Hecataeus of Miletus. Other speculations on the shape of Earth include a seven-layered ziggurat or cosmic mountain, alluded to in the Avesta and ancient Persian writings (see seven climes). The realization that the figure of the Earth is more accurately described as an ellipsoid dates to the 17th century, as described by Isaac Newton in Principia. In the early 19th century, the flattening of the earth ellipsoid was determined to be of the order of 1/300 (Delambre, Everest). The modern value as determined by the US DoD World Geodetic System since the 1960s is close to 1/298.25.[9] Cause [ edit ] The Earth is massive enough that gravity maintains it as a roughly spherical shape. Its formation into a sphere was made easy by its primordial hot, liquid phase. Formation [ edit ] The Solar System formed from a dust cloud that was at least partially the remnant of one or more supernovas that created heavy elements by nucleosynthesis. Grains of matter accreted through electrostatic interaction. As they grew in mass, gravity took over in gathering yet more mass, releasing the potential energy of their collisions and in-falling as heat. The protoplanetary disk also had a greater proportion of radioactive elements than the Earth today because, over time, those elements decayed. Their decay heated the early Earth even further, and continue to contribute to Earth's internal heat budget. The early Earth was thus mostly liquid. A sphere is the only stable shape for a non-rotating, gravitationally self-attracting liquid. The outward acceleration caused by the Earth's rotation is greater at the equator than at the poles (where is it zero), so the sphere gets deformed into an ellipsoid, which represents the shape having the lowest potential energy for a rotating, fluid body. This ellipsoid is slightly fatter around the equator than a perfect sphere would be. Earth's shape is also slightly lumpy because it is composed of different materials of different densities that exert slightly different amounts of gravitational force per volume. The liquidity of a hot, newly formed planet allows heavier elements to sink down to the middle and forces lighter elements closer to the surface, a process known as planetary differentiation. This event is known as the iron catastrophe; the most abundant heavier elements were iron and nickel, which now form the Earth's core. Later shape changes and effects [ edit ] Though the surface rocks of the Earth have cooled enough to solidify, the outer core of the planet is still hot enough to remain liquid. Energy is still being released; volcanic and tectonic activity has pushed rocks into hills and mountains and blown them out of calderas. Meteors also create impact craters and surrounding ridges. However, if the energy release ceases from these processes, then they tend to erode away over time and return toward the lowest potential-energy curve of the ellipsoid. Weather powered by solar energy can also move water, rock, and soil to make the Earth slightly out of round. Earth undulates as the shape of its lowest potential energy changes daily due to the gravity of the Sun and Moon as they move around with respect to the Earth. This is what causes tides in the oceans' water, which can flow freely along the changing potential. Shapes of other bodies [ edit ] Composite image showing the round dwarf planet Ceres ; the slightly smaller, mostly round Vesta ; and the much smaller, much lumpier Eros The amorphous nucleus of the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko The IAU definitions of planet and dwarf planet require that a Sun-orbiting body has undergone the rounding process to reach a roughly spherical shape, an achievement known as hydrostatic equilibrium. The same spheroidal shape can be seen from smaller rocky planets like Mars to gas giants like Jupiter. Any natural Sun-orbiting body that has not reached hydrostatic equilibrium is classified by the IAU as a small Solar System body (SSB). These come in many non-spherical shapes which are lumpy masses accreted haphazardly by in-falling dust and rock; not enough mass falls in to generate the heat needed to complete the rounding. Some SSSBs are just collections of relatively small rocks that are weakly held next to each other by gravity but are not actually fused into a single big bedrock. Some larger SSSBs are nearly round but have not reached hydrostatic equilibrium. The small Solar System body 4 Vesta is large enough to have undergone at least partial planetary differentiation. Stars like the Sun are also spheroidal due to gravity's effects on their plasma, which is a free-flowing fluid. Ongoing stellar fusion is a much greater source of heat for stars compared to the initial heat released during formation. Effects and empirical confirmation [ edit ] The roughly spherical shape of the Earth can be confirmed by many different types of observation from ground level, aircraft, and spacecraft. The shape causes a number of phenomena that a flat Earth would not. Some of these phenomena and observations would be possible on other shapes, such as a curved disc or torus, but no other shape would explain all of them. Spacecraft [ edit ] Many pictures have been taken of the entire Earth by satellites launched by a variety of governments and private organizations. From high orbits, where half the planet can be seen at once, it is plainly spherical. The only way to piece together all the pictures taken of the ground from lower orbits so that all the surface features line up seamlessly and without distortion is to put them on an approximately spherical surface. Astronauts in low Earth orbit can personally see the curvature of the planet, and travel all the way around several times a day. The astronauts who travelled to the Moon have seen the entire Moon-facing half at once, and can watch the sphere rotate once a day (approximately; the Moon is also moving with respect to the Earth). Aircraft [ edit ] People in high-flying aircraft or skydiving from high-altitude balloons can plainly see the curvature of the Earth.[10] Commercial aircraft do not necessarily fly high enough to make this obvious. Trying to measure the curvature of the horizon by taking a picture is complicated by the fact that camera lenses can produce distorted images depending on the angle used. An extreme version of this effect can be seen in the fisheye lens. Scientific measurements would require a carefully calibrated lens. The fastest way for an airplane to travel between two distant cities is a great circle route, which deviates significantly from what would be the fastest straight-line travel path on a flat Earth. Photos of the ground taken from airplanes over a large enough area also do not fit seamlessly together on a flat surface, but do fit on a roughly spherical surface. Aerial photographs of large areas must be corrected to account for curvature.[11] Visibility of distant objects [ edit ] On a completely flat Earth with no visual interference (such as trees, hills, or atmospheric haze) the ground itself would never obscure distant objects; one would be able to see all the way to the edge of the surface. A spherical surface has a horizon which is closer when viewed from a lower altitude.[12] In theory, a person standing on the surface with eyes 1.8 metres (5 ft 11 in) above the ground can see the ground up to about 4.79 kilometres (2.98 mi) away, but a person at the top of the Eiffel Tower at 273 metres (896 ft) can see the ground up to about 58.98 kilometres (36.65 mi) away.[13] This phenomenon would seem to present a method to verify that the Earth's surface is locally convex. If the degree of curvature was determined to be the same everywhere on the Earth's surface, and that surface was determined to be large enough, it would show that the Earth is spherical. In practice, this turns out to be an unreliable method of measurement, due to variations in atmospheric refraction. This additional effect can give the impression that the Earth's surface is flat, curved more convexly than it is, or even that it is concave, by bending light travelling near the surface of the Earth (as happened in various trials of the famous Bedford Level experiment). The phenomenon of variable atmospheric bending can be empirically confirmed by noting that sometimes the refractive layers of air can cause the image of a distant object to be broken into pieces or even turned upside down. This is commonly seen at sunset, when the Sun's shape is distorted, but has also been photographed happening for ships, and has caused the city of Chicago to appear normally, upside down, and broken into pieces from across Lake Michigan (from where it is normally below the horizon).[14][15] Because of their longer wavelengths, radio waves are even more susceptible to atmospheric refraction and reflection, which can cause radio and television signals to be received from towers thousands of miles away which cannot be seen with visible light. When the atmosphere is relatively well-mixed, the visual effects generally expected of a spherical Earth can be observed. For example, ships travelling on large bodies of water (such as the ocean) disappear over the horizon progressively, such that the highest part of the ship can still be seen even when lower parts cannot, proportional to distance from the observer. The same is true of the coastline or mountain when viewed from a ship or from across a large lake or flat terrain.[16][17] Lunar eclipses [ edit ] The shadow of the Earth on the Moon during a lunar eclipse is always a dark circle that moves from one side of the Moon to the other (partially grazing it during a partial eclipse). This could be produced by a flat disc that always faces the Moon head-on during the eclipse, but this is inconsistent with the fact that the Moon is only rarely directly overhead during an eclipse. For each eclipse, the local surface of the Earth is pointed in a somewhat different direction. The shadow of a circular disc held at an angle is an oval, not a circle as is seen during the eclipse. The idea of the Earth being a flat disc is also inconsistent with the fact that a given lunar eclipse is only visible from half of the Earth at a time. The only shape that casts a round shadow no matter which direction it is pointed is a sphere, and the ancient Greeks deduced that this must mean the Earth is spherical.[18] Observation of the stars at altitude [ edit ] On a perfectly spherical Earth, flat terrain or ocean, when viewed from the surface, blocks exactly half the sky - a hemisphere of 180°. Moving away from the surface of the Earth means that the ground blocks less and less of the sky. For example, when viewed from the Moon, the Earth blocks only a small portion of the sky, because it is so distant. This phenomenon of geometry means that when viewed from a high mountain, flat ground or ocean blocks less than 180° of the sky. The rate of change in the angle blocked by the sky as altitude increases is different for a disc than a sphere, and values observed show that the Earth is locally convex. (The angles blocked would also be different for a mountain close to the edge of a flat Earth compared to a mountain in the middle of a flat Earth, and this is not observed.) In theory, measurements of this type from all around the Earth would confirm that it is a complete sphere (as opposed to some other shape with convex areas) though actually taking all those measurements would be very expensive. Using other evidence to hypothesize a spherical shape, the medieval Iranian scholar Al-Biruni used this phenomenon to calculate the Earth's circumference to within 16.8 kilometres (10.4 mi) of the correct value.[17] Observation of the fixed stars from different locations [ edit ] The fixed stars can be demonstrated to be very far away, by diurnal parallax measurements (a technique known at least as early as Ancient Greece). Unlike the Sun, Moon, and planets, they do not change position with respect to one another (at least not perceptibly over the span of a human lifetime); the shapes of the constellations are always the same. This makes them a convenient reference background for determining the shape of the Earth. Adding distance measurements on the ground allows calculation of the Earth's size. The fact that different stars are visible from different locations on the Earth was noticed in ancient times. Aristotle wrote that some stars are visible from Egypt which are not visible from Europe.[17] This would not be possible if the Earth was flat.[12] At the North Pole it is continuously nighttime for six months of the year and the same hemisphere of stars (a 180° view) are always visible making one counterclockwise rotation every 24 hours. The star Polaris (the "North Star") is almost at the center of this rotation (which is directly overhead). Some of the 88 modern constellations visible are Ursa Major (including the Big Dipper), Cassiopeia, and Andromeda. The other six months of the year, it is continuously daytime and the light from the Sun mostly blots out the stars. (The location of the poles can be defined by these phenomena, which only occur there; more than 24 hours of continuous daylight can occur north of the Arctic Circle and south of the Antarctic Circle.) At the South Pole, a completely non-overlapping set of constellations are visible during the six months of continuous nighttime, including Orion, Crux, and Centaurus. This 180° hemisphere of stars rotate clockwise once every 24 hours, around a point directly overhead (where there do not happen to be any particularly bright stars). The fact that the stars visible from the north and south poles do not overlap must mean that the two observation spots are on opposite sides of the Earth, which is not possible if the Earth is a single-sided disc, but is possible for other shapes (like a sphere, but also any other convex shape like a donut or dumbbell). From any point on the equator, 360° of stars are visible over the course of the night, as the sky rotates around a line drawn from due north to due south (which could be defined as "the directions to walk to get to the poles in the shortest amount of time"). When facing east, the stars visible from the north pole are on the left, and the stars visible from the south pole are on the right. This means the equator must be facing at a 90° angle from the poles. The direction any intermediate spot on the Earth is facing can also be calculated by measuring the angles of the fixed stars and determining how much of the sky is visible. For example, New York City is about 40° north of the equator. The apparent motion of the Sun blots out slightly different parts of the sky from day to day, but over the course of the entire year it sees a dome of 280° (360° - 80°). So for example, both Orion and the Big Dipper are visible during at least part of the year. Making stellar observations from a representative set of points across the Earth, combined with knowing the shortest on-the-ground distance between any two given points makes an approximate sphere the only possible shape for the Earth. Knowing the difference in angle between two points on the Earth's surface and the surface distance between them allows a calculation of the Earth's size. Using observations at Rhodes (in Greece) and Alexandria (in Egypt) and the distance between them, the Ancient Greek philosopher Posidonius actually did use this technique to calculate the circumference of the planet to within perhaps 4% of the correct value (though modern equivalents of his units of measure are not precisely known). Surface circumnavigation [ edit ] Since the 1500s, many people have sailed or flown completely around the world in all directions, and none have discovered an edge or impenetrable barrier. (See Circumnavigation, Arctic exploration, and History of Antarctica.) Some flat Earth theories that propose the world is a north-pole-centered disc, conceive of Antarctica as an impenetrable ice wall that encircles the planet and hides any edges.[19] This disc model explains east-west circumnavigation as simply moving around the disc in a circle. (East-west paths form a circle in both disc and spherical geometry.) It is possible in this model to traverse the North Pole, but it is not possible to perform a circumnavigation that includes the South Pole (which it posits does not exist). Explorers, government researchers, commercial pilots, and tourists have been to Antarctica and found that it is not a large ring that encircles the entire world, but actually a roughly disc-shaped continent smaller than South America but larger than Australia, with an interior that can in fact be traversed in order to take a shorter path from e.g. the tip of South America to Australia than would be possible on a disc. The first land crossing of the entirety of Antarctica was the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1955-1958, and many exploratory airplanes have since passed over the continent in various directions.[20][21] Observing the Sun [ edit ] On a flat Earth, an omnidirectional Sun (emitting light in all directions, as it does) would illuminate the entire surface at the same time, and all places would experience sunrise and sunset at the horizon at the same time (with some small variations due to mountains and valleys). With a spherical Earth, half the planet is in daylight at any given time (the hemisphere facing the Sun) and the other half is experiencing nighttime. When a given location on the spherical Earth is in sunlight, its antipode - the location exactly on the opposite side of the Earth - is always experiencing nighttime. The spherical shape of the Earth causes the Sun to rise and set at different times in different places, and different locations get different amounts of sunlight each day. In order to explain day and night, time zones, and the seasons, some flat Earth theorists propose that the Sun does not emit light in all directions, but acts more like a spotlight, only illuminating part of the flat Earth at a time.[22][23] This theory is not consistent with observation; at sunrise and sunset, a spotlight Sun would be up in the sky at least a little bit, rather than at the horizon where it is always actually observed. A spotlight Sun would also appear at different angles in the sky with respect to a flat ground than it does with respect to a curved ground. Assuming light travels in straight lines, actual measurements of the Sun's angle in the sky from locations very distant from each other are only consistent with a geometry where the Sun is very far away and is being seen from a hemispherical surface (the daylight half of the Earth). These two phenomena are related: a low-altitude spotlight Sun would spent most of the day near the horizon for most locations on Earth (which is not observed), but rise and set fairly close to the horizon. A high-altitude Sun would spend more of the day away from the horizon, but rise and set fairly far from the horizon (which is not observed). Local solar time and time zones [ edit ] Ancient timekeeping reckoned "noon" as the time of day when the Sun is highest in the sky, with the rest of the hours in the day measured against that. During the day, the apparent solar time can be measured directly with a sundial. In ancient Egypt, the first known sundials divided the day into 12 hours, though because the length of the day changed with the season, the length of the hours also changed. Sundials that defined hours as always being the same duration appeared in the Renaissance. In Western Europe, clock towers and striking clocks were used in the Middle Ages to keep people nearby appraised of the local time, though compared to modern times this was less important in a largely agrarian society. Because the Sun reaches its highest point at different times for different longitudes (about four minutes of time for every degree of longitude difference east or west), the local solar noon in each city is different except for those directly north or south of each other. This means that the clocks in different cities could be offset from each other by minutes or hours. As clocks became more precise and industrialization made timekeeping more important, cities switched to mean solar time, which ignores minor variations in the timing of local solar noon over the year, due to the elliptical nature of the Earth's orbit, and its tilt. The differences in clock time between cities was not generally a problem until the advent of railroad travel in the 1800s, which both made travel between distant cities much faster than by walking or horse, and also required passengers to show up at specific times to meet their desired trains. In the United Kingdom, railroads gradually switched to Greenwich Mean Time (set from local time at the Greenwich observatory in London), followed by public clocks across the country generally, forming a single time zone. In the United States, railroads published schedules based on local time, then later based on standard time for that railroad (typically the local time at the railroad's headquarters), and then finally based on four standard time zones shared across all railroads, where neighboring zones differed by exactly one hour. At first railroad time was synchronized by portable chronometers, and then later by telegraph and radio signals. San Francisco[24] is at 122.41°W longitude and Richmond, Virginia[25] is at 77.46°W longitude. They are both at about 37.6°N latitude (±.2°). The approximately 45° of longitude difference translates into about 180 minutes, or 3 hours, of time between sunsets in the two cities, for example. San Francisco is in the Pacific Time zone, and Richmond is in the Eastern Time zone, which are three hours apart, so the local clocks in each city show that the Sun sets at about the same time when using the local time zone. But a phone call from Richmond to San Francisco at sunset will reveal that there are still three hours of daylight left in California. Length of the day [ edit ] On a flat Earth with an omnidirectional Sun, all places would experience the same amount of daylight every day, and all places would get daylight at the same time. Actual day length varies considerably, with places closer to the poles getting very long days in the summer and very short days in the winter, with northerly summer happening at the same time as southerly winter. Places north of the Arctic Circle and south of the Antarctic Circle get no sunlight for at least one day a year, and get 24-hour sunlight for at least one day a year. Both the poles experience sunlight for 6 months and darkness for 6 months, at opposite times. The movement of daylight between the northern and southern hemispheres happens because of the axial tilt of the Earth. The imaginary line around which the Earth spins, which goes between the North Pole and South Pole, is tilted about 23° from the oval that describes its orbit around the Sun. The Earth always points in the same direction as it moves around the Sun, so for half the year (summer in the Northern Hemisphere), the North Pole is pointed slightly toward the Sun, keeping it in daylight all the time because the Sun lights up the half of the Earth that is facing it (and the North Pole is always in that half due to the tilt). For the other half of the orbit, the South Pole is tilted slightly toward the Sun, and it is winter in the Northern Hemisphere. This means that at the equator, the Sun is not directly overhead at noon, except around the autumnal equinox and vernal equinox, when one spot on the equator is pointed directly at the Sun. The length of the day varies because as the Earth rotates some places (near the poles) pass through only a short curve near the top or bottom of the sunlight half; other places (near the equator) travel along much longer curves through the middle. The length of twilight would be very different on a flat Earth. On a round Earth, the atmosphere above the ground is lit for a while before sunrise and after sunset are observed at ground level, because the Sun is still visible from higher altitudes. Longer twilights are observed at higher latitudes (near the poles) due to a shallower angle of the Sun's apparent movement compared to the horizon. On a flat Earth, the Sun's shadow would reach the upper atmosphere very quickly, except near the closest edge of the Earth, and would always set at the same angle to the ground (which is not what is observed). The "spotlight Sun" theory is also not consistent with this observation, since the air cannot be lit without the ground below it also being lit (except for shadows of mountains and other surface obstacles). Determining the shape of the Earth [ edit ] On a given day, if many different cities measure the angle of the Sun at local noon, the resulting data, when combined with the known distances between cities, shows that the Earth has 180 degrees of north-south curvature. (A full range of angles will be observed if the north and south poles are included, and the day chosen is either the autumnal or spring equinox.) This is consistent with many rounded shapes, including a sphere, and is inconsistent with a flat shape. Some claim that this experiment assumes a very distant Sun, such that the incoming rays are essentially parallel, and if a flat Earth is assumed, that the measured angles can allow one to calculate the distance to the Sun, which must be small enough that its incoming rays are not very parallel.[26] However, if more than two relatively well-separated cities are included in the experiment, the calculation will make clear whether the Sun is distant or nearby. For example, on the equinox, the 0 degree angle from the North Pole and the 90 degree angle from the equator predict a Sun which would have to be located essentially next to the surface of a flat Earth, but the difference in angle between the equator and New York City would predict a Sun much further away if the Earth is flat. Because these results are contradictory, the surface of the Earth cannot be flat; the data is consistent with a nearly spherical Earth and a Sun which is very far away compared with the diameter of the Earth. Determining the size of the Earth [ edit ] Using the knowledge that the Sun is very far away, the ancient Greek geographer Eratosthenes performed an experiment using the differences in the observed angle of the Sun from two different locations to calculate the circumference of the Earth. Though modern telecommunications and timekeeping were not available, he was able to make sure the measurements happened at the same time by having them taken when the Sun was highest in the sky (local noon) at both locations. Using slightly inaccurate assumptions about the locations of two cities, he came to a result within 15% of the correct value. Watching the Sun set twice [ edit ] On level ground, the difference in the distance to the horizon between lying down and standing up is large enough to watch the Sun set twice by quickly standing up immediately after seeing it set for the first time while lying down. This also can be done with a cherry picker[27] or a tall building with a fast elevator.[28] On a flat Earth, one would not be able to see the Sun again (unless standing near the edge closest to the Sun) due to a much faster-moving Sun shadow.[17] When the supersonic Concorde took off not long after sunset from London and flew westward to New York faster than the sunset was advancing westward on the ground, passengers observed a sunrise in the west. After landing in New York, passengers saw a second sunset in the west.[29] Because the speed of the Sun's shadow is slower in polar regions (due to the steeper angle), even a subsonic aircraft can overtake the sunset when flying at high latitudes. One photographer used a roughly circular route around the North Pole to take pictures of 24 sunsets in the same 24-hour period, pausing westward progress in each time zone to let the shadow of the Sun catch up.[30] The surface of the Earth rotates at 180.17 miles per hour (289.96 km/h) at 80° north or south, and 1,040.4 miles per hour (1,674.4 km/h) at the equator.[30] Spherical vs. flat triangles [ edit ] Diagram showing how the interior angles of triangles add up to about 180° when plotted on a small, nearly flat area of the Earth, but add up to more than 180° (in this case 230°) when plotted on a large area with significant curvature Because the Earth is spherical, long-distance travel sometimes requires heading in different directions than one would head on a flat Earth. For example, consider an airplane that travels 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi) in a straight line, takes a 90-degree right turn, travels another 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi), takes another 90-degree right turn, and travels 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi) a third time. On a flat Earth, the aircraft would have travelled along three sides of a square, and arrive at a spot about 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi) from where it started. But because the Earth is spherical, in reality it will have travelled along three sides of a triangle, and arrive back very close to its starting point. If the starting point is the North Pole, it would have travelled due south from the North Pole to the equator, then west for a quarter of the way around the Earth, and then due north back to the North Pole. In spherical geometry, the sum of angles inside a triangle is greater than 180° (in this example 270°, having arrived back at the north pole a 90° angle to the departure path) unlike on a flat surface, where it is always exactly 180°.[31] Grids are distorted by spherical ground [ edit ] A meridian of longitude is a line where local solar noon occurs at the same time each day. These lines define "north" and "south". These are perpendicular to lines of latitude that define "east" and "west", where the Sun is at the same angle at local noon on the same day. If the Sun were travelling from east to west over a flat Earth, meridian lines would always be the same distance apart - they would form a square grid when combined with lines of latitude. In reality, meridian lines get farther apart as one travels toward the equator, which is only possible on a round Earth. In places where land is plotted on a grid system, this causes discontinuities in the grid. For example, in areas of the Midwestern United States that use the Public Land Survey System, the northernmost and westernmost sections of a township deviate from what would otherwise be an exact square mile. The resulting discontinuities are sometimes reflected directly in local roads, which have kinks where the grid cannot follow completely straight lines.[32] Weather systems [ edit ] Low-pressure weather systems with inward winds (such as a hurricane) spin counterclockwise north of the equator, but clockwise south of the equator. This is due to the Coriolis force, and requires that (assuming they are attached to each other and rotating in the same direction) the north and southern halves of the Earth are angled in opposite directions (e.g. the north is facing toward Polaris and the south is facing away from it). Gravity [ edit ] The laws of gravity, chemistry, and physics that explain the formation and rounding of the Earth are well-tested through experiment, and applied successfully to many engineering tasks. From these laws, we know the amount of mass the Earth contains, and that a non-spherical planet the size of the Earth would not be able to support itself against its own gravity. A flat disc the size of the Earth, for example, would likely crack, heat up, liquefy, and re-form into a roughly spherical shape. On a disc strong enough to maintain its shape, gravity would not pull downward with respect to the surface, but would pull toward the center of the disc,[12] contrary to what is observed on level terrain (and which would create major problems with oceans flowing toward the center of the disk). Ignoring the other concerns, some flat Earth theorists explain the observed surface "gravity" by proposing that the flat Earth is constantly accelerating upwards.[23] Such a theory would also leave open for explanation the tides seen in Earth's oceans, which are conventionally explained by the gravity exerted by the Sun and Moon. Technology [ edit ] Observation of Foucault pendulums, popular in science museums around the world, demonstrate both that the world is spherical and that it rotates (not that the stars are rotating around it). The mathematics of navigation by GPS assume that satellites are moving in known orbits around an approximately spherical surface. The accuracy of GPS navigation in determining latitude and longitude and the way these numbers map onto locations on the ground show that these assumptions are correct. The same is true for the operational GLONASS system run by Russia, and the in-development European Galileo, Chinese BeiDou, and Indian IRNSS. Satellites, including communications satellites used for television, telephone, and Internet connections, would not stay in orbit unless the modern theory of gravitation were correct. The details of which satellites are visible from which places on the ground at which times prove an approximately spherical shape of the Earth. (Undersea cables are also used for intercontinental communications.) Radio transmitters are mounted on tall towers because they generally rely on line-of-sight propagation. The distance to the horizon is further at higher altitude, so mounting them higher significantly increases the area they can serve.[33] Some signals can be transmitted at much longer distances, but only if they are at frequencies where they can use groundwave propagation, tropospheric propagation, tropospheric scatter, or ionospheric propagation to reflect or refract signals around the curve of the Earth. Architecture [ edit ] The design of some large structures needs to take the shape of the Earth into account. For example, the towers of the Humber Bridge, although both vertical with respect to gravity, are 36 mm (1.4 inches) farther apart at the top than the bottom due to the local curvature.[34] History [ edit ] Antiquity [ edit ] Hebrew Bible [ edit ] The Hebrew Bible imagined a three-part world, with the heavens (shamayim) above, Earth (eres) in the middle, and the underworld (sheol) below.[35] After the 4th century BC this was gradually replaced by a Greek scientific cosmology of a spherical Earth surrounded by multiple concentric heavens.[36] The bible is the first known documentation of a spherical earth that hangs in empty space. At Job 26:7 the bible states that "He [God] stretches the northern sky over empty space, Suspending the earth upon nothing." The book of Job was written in the 15 century B.C.E. At Isaiah 40:22 the bible states "There is One [God] who dwells above the circle [or sphere] of the earth, ..." The book of Isaiah was written in the 8 century B.C.E. The Hebrew word Sheol is literally translated into English as the common grave of man or the dirt six feet under, not another realm beneath the surface. One example is at Genesis 35:20; it states "Jacob set up a pillar [or grave stone] over her grave[Hebrew Sheol]; it is the pillar of Rachel's grave[Hebrew Sheol] to this day." Heavens can mean the spiritual realm which is not a part of the earth or the entire physical universe, or it can refer to the skys and atmospheres of earth. Hellenistic world [ edit ] Though the earliest written mention of a spherical Earth comes from ancient Greek sources, there is no account of how the sphericity of the Earth was discovered.[37] A plausible explanation is that it was "the experience of travellers that suggested such an explanation for the variation in the observable altitude of the pole and the change in the area of circumpolar stars, a change that was quite drastic between Greek settlements"[38] around the eastern Mediterranean Sea, particularly those between the Nile Delta and Crimea.[38] In The Histories, written 431–425 BC, Herodotus cast doubt on a report of the Sun observed shining from the north. He stated that the phenomenon was observed during a circumnavigation of Africa undertaken by Phoenician explorers employed by Egyptian pharaoh Necho II c. 610–595 BC (The Histories, 4.42) who claimed to have had the Sun on their right when circumnavigating in a clockwise direction. To modern historians, these details confirm the truth of the Phoenicians' report and even open the possibility that the Phoenicians knew about the spherical model. However, nothing certain about their knowledge of geography and navigation has survived.[39] Pythagoras [ edit ] Early Greek philosophers alluded to a spherical Earth, though with some ambiguity.[40] Pythagoras (6th century BC) was among those said to have originated the idea, but this might reflect the ancient Greek practice of ascribing every discovery to one or another of their ancient wise men.[37] Some idea of the sphericity of the Earth seems to have been known to both Parmenides and Empedocles in the 5th century BC,[41] and although the idea cannot reliably be ascribed to Pythagoras,[42] it might nevertheless have been formulated in the Pythagorean school in the 5th century BC[37][41] although some disagree.[43] After the 5th century BC, no Greek writer of repute thought the world was anything but round.[40] Plato [ edit ] Plato (427–347 BC) travelled to southern Italy to study Pythagorean mathematics. When he returned to Athens and established his school, Plato also taught his students that Earth was a sphere, though he offered no justifications. "My conviction is that the Earth is a round body in the centre of the heavens, and therefore has no need of air or of any similar force to be a support".[44] If man could soar high above the clouds, Earth would resemble "one of those balls which have leather coverings in twelve pieces, and is decked with various colours, of which the colours used by painters on Earth are in a manner samples."[45] In Timaeus, his one work that was available throughout the Middle Ages in Latin, we read that the Creator "made the world in the form of a globe, round as from a lathe, having its extremes in every direction equidistant from the centre, the most perfect and the most like itself of all figures",[46] though the word "world" here refers to the heavens. Aristotle [ edit ] Aristotle (384–322 BC) was Plato's prize student and "the mind of the school".[47] Aristotle observed "there are stars seen in Egypt and [...] Cyprus which are not seen in the northerly regions." Since this could only happen on a curved surface, he too believed Earth was a sphere "of no great size, for otherwise the effect of so slight a change of place would not be quickly apparent." (De caelo, 298a2–10) Aristotle provided physical and observational arguments supporting the idea of a spherical Earth: Every portion of the Earth tends toward the centre until by compression and convergence they form a sphere. ( De caelo , 297a9–21) , 297a9–21) Travelers going south see southern constellations rise higher above the horizon; and The shadow of Earth on the Moon during a lunar eclipse is round. (De caelo, 297b31–298a10). The concepts of symmetry, equilibrium and cyclic repetition permeated Aristotle's work. In his Meteorology he divided the world into five climatic zones: two temperate areas separated by a torrid zone near the equator, and two cold inhospitable regions, "one near our upper or northern pole and the other near the ... southern pole," both impenetrable and girdled with ice (Meteorologica, 362a31–35). Although no humans could survive in the frigid zones, inhabitants in the southern temperate regions could exist. Aristotle's theory of natural place relied on a spherical Earth to explain why heavy things go down (toward what Aristotle believed was the center of the Universe), and things like air and fire go up. In this geocentric model, the structure of the universe was believed to be a series of perfect spheres. The Sun, Moon, planets and fixed stars were believed to move on celestial spheres around a stationary Earth. Though Aristotle's theory of physics survived in the Christian world for many centuries, the heliocentric model was eventually shown to be a more correct explanation of the Solar System than the geocentric model, and atomic theory was shown to be a more correct explanation of the nature of matter than classical elements like earth, water, air, fire, and aether. Archimedes [ edit ] In proposition 2 of the First Book of his treatise "On floating bodies," Archimedes demonstrates that "The surface of any fluid at rest is the surface of a sphere whose centre is the same as that of the Earth".[48] Subsequently, in propositions 8 and 9 of the same work, he assumes the result of proposition 2 that the Earth is a sphere and that the surface of a fluid on it is a sphere centered on the center of the Earth.[49] Eratosthenes [ edit ] Eratosthenes, a Greek astronomer from Hellenistic Cyrenaica (276–194 BC), estimated Earth's circumference around 240 BC. He had heard that in Syene the Sun was directly overhead at the summer solstice whereas in Alexandria it still cast a shadow. Using the differing angles the shadows made as the basis of his trigonometric calculations he estimated a circumference of around 250,000 stades. The length of a 'stade' is not precisely known, but Eratosthenes's figure only has an error of around five to fifteen percent.[50][51][52] Eratosthenes used rough estimates and round numbers, but depending on the length of the stadion, his result is within a margin of between 2% and 20% of the actual meridional circumference, 40,008 kilometres (24,860 mi). Note that Eratosthenes could only measure the circumference of the Earth by assuming that the distance to the Sun is so great that the rays of sunlight are practically parallel.[53] Seventeen hundred years after Eratosthenes, Christopher Columbus studied Eratosthenes's findings before sailing west for the Indies. However, ultimately he rejected Eratosthenes in favour of other maps and arguments that interpreted Earth's circumference to be a third smaller than reality. If, instead, Columbus had accepted Eratosthenes findings, then he may have never gone west, since he didn't have the supplies or funding needed for the much longer voyage.[54] Seleucus of Seleucia [ edit ] Seleucus of Seleucia (c. 190 BC), who lived in the city of Seleucia in Mesopotamia, wrote that the Earth is spherical (and actually orbits the Sun, influenced by the heliocentric theory of Aristarchus of Samos). Posidonius [ edit ] Posidonius (c. 135 – 51 BC) put faith in Eratosthenes's method, though by observing the star Canopus, rather than the Sun in establishing the Earth's circumference. In Ptolemy's Geographia, his result was favoured over that of Eratosthenes. Posidonius furthermore expressed the distance of the Sun in Earth radii. Roman Empire [ edit ] From its Greek origins, the idea of a spherical Earth, along with much of Greek astronomical thought, slowly spread across the globe and ultimately became the adopted view in all major astronomical traditions.[3][4][5][6] In the West, the idea came to the Romans through the lengthy process of cross-fertilization with Hellenistic civilization. Many Roman authors such as Cicero and Pliny refer in their works to the rotundity of the Earth as a matter of course.[55] Strabo [ edit ] When a ship is at the horizon, its lower part is obscured by the Earth's curvature. This was one of the first arguments favouring a round-Earth model. It has been suggested that seafarers probably provided the first observational evidence that the Earth was not flat, based on observations of the horizon. This argument was put forward by the geographer Strabo (c. 64 BC – 24 AD), who suggested that the spherical shape of the Earth was probably known to seafarers around the Mediterranean Sea since at least the time of Homer,[56] citing a line from the Odyssey[57] as indicating that the poet Homer knew of this as early as the 7th or 8th century BC. Strabo cited various phenomena observed at sea as suggesting that the Earth was spherical. He observed that elevated lights or areas of land were visible to sailors at greater distances than those less elevated, and stated that the curvature of the sea was obviously responsible for this.[58] Claudius Ptolemy [ edit ] Claudius Ptolemy (90–168 AD) lived in Alexandria, the centre of scholarship in the 2nd century. In the Almagest, which remained the standard work of astronomy for 1,400 years, he advanced many arguments for the spherical nature of the Earth. Among them was the observation that when a ship is sailing towards mountains, observers note these seem to rise from the sea, indicating that they were hidden by the curved surface of the sea. He also gives separate arguments that the Earth is curved north-south and that it is curved east-west.[59] He compiled an eight-volume Geographia covering what was known about the Earth. The first part of the Geographia is a discussion of the data and of the methods he used. As with the model of the Solar System in the Almagest, Ptolemy put all this information into a grand scheme. He assigned coordinates to all the places and geographic features he knew, in a grid that spanned the globe (although most of this has been lost). Latitude was measured from the equator, as it is today, but Ptolemy preferred to express it as the length of the longest day rather than degrees of arc (the length of the midsummer day increases from 12h to 24h as you go from the equator to the polar circle). He put the meridian of 0 longitude at the most western land he knew, the Canary Islands. Geographia indicated the countries of "Serica" and "Sinae" (China) at the extreme right, beyond the island of "Taprobane" (Sri Lanka, oversized) and the "Aurea Chersonesus" (Southeast Asian peninsula). Ptolemy also devised and provided instructions on how to create maps both of the whole inhabited world (oikoumenè) and of the Roman provinces. In the second part of the Geographia, he provided the necessary topographic lists, and captions for the maps. His oikoumenè spanned 180 degrees of longitude from the Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean to China, and about 81 degrees of latitude from the Arctic to the East Indies and deep into Africa. Ptolemy was well aware that he knew about only a quarter of the globe. Late Antiquity [ edit ] Knowledge of the spherical shape of the Earth was received in scholarship of Late Antiquity as a matter of course, in both Neoplatonism and Early Christianity. Calcidius's fourth-century Latin commentary on and translation of Plato's Timaeus, which was one of the few examples of Greek scientific thought that was known in the Early Middle Ages in Western Europe, discussed Hipparchus's use of the geometrical circumstances of eclipses to compute the relative diameters of the Sun, Earth, and Moon.[60][61] Theological doubt informed by the flat Earth model implied in the Hebrew Bible inspired some early Christian scholars such as Lactantius, John Chrysostom and Athanasius of Alexandria, but this remained an eccentric current. Learned Christian authors such as Basil of Caesarea, Ambrose and Augustine of Hippo were clearly aware of the sphericity of the Earth. "Flat Earthism" lingered longest in Syriac Christianity, which tradition laid greater importance on a literalist interpretation of the Old Testament. Authors from that tradition, such as Cosmas Indicopleustes, presented the Earth as flat as late as in the 6th century. This last remnant of the ancient model of the cosmos disappeared during the 7th century. From the 8th century and the beginning medieval period, "no cosmographer worthy of note has called into question the sphericity of the Earth."[62] India [ edit ] Greek ethnographer Megasthenes, c. 300 BC, has been interpreted as stating that the contemporary Brahmans believed in a spherical Earth as the center of the universe.[63] With the spread of Greek culture in the east, Hellenistic astronomy filtered eastwards to ancient India where its profound influence became apparent in the early centuries AD.[64] The Greek concept of an Earth surrounded by the spheres of the planets and that of the fixed stars, vehemently supported by astronomers like Varahamihir and Brahmagupta, strengthened the astronomical principles. Some ideas were found possible to preserve, although in altered form.[64][65] The works of the classical Indian astronomer and mathematician, Aryabhatta (476–550 AD), deal with the sphericity of the Earth and the motion of the planets. The final two parts of his Sanskrit magnum opus, the Aryabhatiya, which were named the Kalakriya ("reckoning of time") and the Gol ("sphere"), state that the Earth is spherical and that its circumference is 4,967 yojanas. In modern units this is 39,968 km (24,835 mi), close to the current equatorial value of 40,075 km (24,901 mi).[66][67] Middle Ages [ edit ] Knowledge of the sphericity of the Earth survived into the medieval corpus of knowledge by direct transmission of the texts of Greek antiquity (Aristotle), and via authors such as Isidore of Seville and Beda Venerabilis. It became increasingly traceable with the rise of scholasticism and medieval learning.[55] Spread of this knowledge beyond the immediate sphere of Greco-Roman scholarship was necessarily gradual, associated with the pace of Christianisation of Europe. For example, the first evidence of knowledge of the spherical shape of the Earth in Scandinavia is a 12th-century Old Icelandic translation of Elucidarius.[68] A non-exhaustive list of more than a hundred Latin and vernacular writers from Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages who were aware that the earth was spherical has been compiled by Reinhard Krüger, professor for Romance literature at the University of Stuttgart.[55] Early Medieval world [ edit ] Liber Divinorum Operum by Spherical Earth with the four seasons. Illustration in 12th-century bookby Hildegard of Bingen Isidore of Seville Bishop Isidore of Seville (560–636) taught in his widely read encyclopedia, The Etymologies, that the Earth was "round".[69] The bishop's confusing exposition and choice of imprecise Latin terms have divided scholarly opinion on whether he meant a sphere or a disk or even whether he meant anything specific.[70] Notable recent scholars claim that he taught a spherical Earth.[71] Isidore did not admit the possibility of people dwelling at the antipodes, considering them as legendary[72] and noting that there was no evidence for their existence.[73] Bede the Venerable The monk Bede (c. 672–735) wrote in his influential treatise on computus, The Reckoning of Time, that the Earth was round. He explained the unequal length of daylight from "the roundness of the Earth, for not without reason is it called 'the orb of the world' on the pages of Holy Scripture and of ordinary literature. It is, in fact, set like a sphere in the middle of the whole universe." (De temporum ratione, 32). The large number of surviving manuscripts of The Reckoning of Time, copied to meet the Carolingian requirement that all priests should study the computus, indicates that many, if not most, priests were exposed to the idea of the sphericity of the Earth.[74] Ælfric of Eynsham paraphrased Bede into Old English, saying, "Now the Earth's roundness and the Sun's orbit constitute the obstacle to the day's being equally long in every land."[75] Bede was lucid about Earth's sphericity, writing "We call the earth a globe, not as if the shape of a sphere were expressed in the diversity of plains and mountains, but because, if all things are included in the outline, the earth's circumference will represent the figure of a perfect globe... For truly it is an orb placed in the centre of the universe; in its width it is like a circle, and not circular like a shield but rather like a ball, and it extends from its centre with perfect roundness on all sides."[76] Anania Shirakatsi The 7th-century Armenian scholar Anania Shirakatsi described the world as "being like an egg with a spherical yolk (the globe) surrounded by a layer of white (the atmosphere) and covered with a hard shell (the sky)."[77] Islamic astronomy [ edit ] Islamic astronomy was developed on the basis of a spherical earth inherited from Hellenistic astronomy.[78] The Islamic theoretical framework largely relied on the fundamental contributions of Aristotle (De caelo) and Ptolemy (Almagest), both of whom worked from the premise that the Earth was spherical and at the centre of the universe (geocentric model).[78] Early Islamic scholars recognized Earth's sphericity,[79] leading Muslim mathematicians to develop spherical trigonometry[80] in order to further mensuration and to calculate the distance and direction from any given point on the Earth to Mecca. This determined the Qibla, or Muslim direction of prayer. Al-Ma'mun Around 830 AD, Caliph al-Ma'mun commissioned a group of Muslim astronomers and geographers to measure the distance from Tadmur (Palmyra) to Raqqa in modern Syria. They found the cities to be separated by one degree of latitude and the meridian arc distance between them to be 662⁄ 3 miles and thus calculated the Earth's circumference to be 24,000 miles.[81] Another estimate given by his astronomers was 562⁄ 3 Arabic miles (111.8 km) per degree, which corresponds to a circumference of 40,248 km, very close to the currently modern values of 111.3 km per degree and 40,068 km circumference, respectively.[82] Ibn Hazm Andalusian polymath Ibn Hazm stated that the proof of the Earth's sphericity "is that the Sun is always vertical to a particular spot on Earth".[83] Al-Farghānī Al-Farghānī (Latinized as Alfraganus) was a Persian astronomer of the 9th century involved in measuring the diameter of the Earth, and commissioned by Al-Ma'mun. His estimate given above for a degree (562⁄ 3 Arabic miles) was much more accurate than the 602⁄ 3 Roman miles (89.7 km) given by Ptolemy. Christopher Columbus uncritically used Alfraganus's figure as if it were in Roman miles instead of in Arabic miles, in order to prove a smaller size of the Earth than that propounded by Ptolemy.[84] Biruni Biruni's method for calculation of Earth's radius Abu Rayhan Biruni (973–1048) used a new method to accurately compute the Earth's circumference, by which he arrived at a value that was close to modern values for the Earth's circumference.[85] His estimate of 6,339.6 km for the Earth radius was only 31.4 km less than the modern mean value of 6,371.0 km.[86] In contrast to his predecessors, who measured the Earth's circumference by sighting the Sun simultaneously from two different locations, Biruni developed a new method of using trigonometric calculations based on the angle between a plain and mountain top. This yielded more accurate measurements of the Earth's circumference and made it possible for a single person to measure it from a single location.[87][88] Biruni's method was intended to avoid "walking across hot, dusty deserts," and the idea came to him when he was on top of a tall mountain in India. From the top of the mountain, he sighted the angle to the horizon which, along with the mountain's height (which he calculated beforehand), allowed him to calculate the curvature of the Earth.[89][90] He also made use of algebra to formulate trigonometric equations and used the astrolabe to measure angles.[91] According to John J. O'Connor and Edmund F. Robertson, Important contributions to geodesy and geography were also made by Biruni. He introduced techniques to measure the earth and distances on it using triangulation. He found the radius of the earth to be 6339.6 km, a value not obtained in the West until the 16th century. His Masudic canon contains a table giving the coordinates of six hundred places, almost all of which he had direct knowledge.[92] Applications Muslim scholars who held to the round Earth theory used it for a quintessentially Islamic purpose: to calculate the distance and direction from any given point on the Earth to Mecca.[93] This determined the Qibla, or Muslim direction of prayer. A terrestrial globe (Kura-i-ard) was among the presents sent by the Persian Muslim astronomer Jamal-al-Din to Kublai Khan's Chinese court in 1267. It was made of wood on which "seven parts of water are represented in green, three parts of land in white, with rivers, lakes etc."[94] Ho Peng Yoke remarks that "it did not seem to have any general appeal to the Chinese in those days".[95] High and late medieval Europe [ edit ] During the High Middle Ages, the astronomical knowledge in Christian Europe was extended beyond what was transmitted directly from ancient authors by transmission of learning from Medieval Islamic astronomy. An early student of such learning was Gerbert d'Aurillac, the later Pope Sylvester II. Saint Hildegard (Hildegard von Bingen, 1098–1179), depicted the spherical Earth several times in her work Liber Divinorum Operum.[96] Johannes de Sacrobosco (c. 1195 – c. 1256 AD) wrote a famous work on Astronomy called Tractatus de Sphaera, based on Ptolemy, which primarily considers the sphere of the sky. However, it contains clear proofs of the Earth's sphericity in the first chapter.[97][98] Many scholastic commentators on Aristotle's On the Heavens and Sacrobosco's Treatise on the Sphere unanimously agreed that the Earth is spherical or round.[99] Grant observes that no author who had studied at a medieval university thought that the Earth was flat.[100] The Elucidarium of Honorius Augustodunensis (c. 1120), an important manual for the instruction of lesser clergy, which was translated into Middle English, Old French, Middle High German, Old Russian, Middle Dutch, Old Norse, Icelandic, Spanish, and several Italian dialects, explicitly refers to a spherical Earth. Likewise, the fact that Bertold von Regensburg (mid-13th century) used the spherical Earth as an illustration in a sermon shows that he could assume this knowledge among his congregation. The sermon was preached in the vernacular German, and thus was not intended for a learned audience. Dante's Divine Comedy, written in Italian in the early 14th century, portrays Earth as a sphere, discussing implications such as the different stars visible in the southern hemisphere, the altered position of the Sun, and the various timezones of the Earth. The Portuguese exploration of Africa and Asia, Columbus's voyage to the Americas (1492) and, finally, Ferdinand Magellan's circumnavigation of the Earth (1519–21) provided practical evidence of the global shape of the Earth. Early Modern period [ edit ] Circumnavigation of the globe [ edit ] Erdapfel, the oldest surviving terrestrial globe (1492/93) The, the oldest surviving terrestrial globe (1492/93) The first direct demonstration of Earth's sphericity came in the form of the first circumnavigation in history, an expedition captained by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan.[101] The expedition was financed by the Spanish Crown. On August 10, 1519, the five ships under Magellan's command departed from Seville. They crossed the Atlantic Ocean, passed through what is now called the Strait of Magellan, crossed the Pacific, and arrived in Cebu, where Magellan was killed by Philippine natives in a battle. His second in command, the Spaniard Juan Sebastián Elcano, continued the expedition and, on September 6, 1522, arrived at Seville, completing the circumnavigation. Charles I of Spain, in recognition of his feat, gave Elcano a coat of arms with the motto Primus circumdedisti me (in Latin, "You went around me first").[102] A circumnavigation alone does not prove that the Earth is spherical. It could be cylindric or irregularly globular or one of many other shapes. Still, combined with trigonometric evidence of the form used by Eratosthenes 1,700 years prior, the Magellan expedition removed any reasonable doubt in educated circles in Europe.[103] The Transglobe Expedition (1979–1982) was the first expedition to make a circumpolar circumnavigation, traveling the world "vertically" traversing both of the poles of rotation using only surface transport. Ming China [ edit ] In the 17th century, the idea of a spherical Earth, now considerably advanced by Western astronomy, ultimately spread to Ming China, when Jesuit missionaries, who held high positions as astronomers at the imperial court, successfully challenged the Chinese belief that the Earth was flat and square.[104][105][106] The Ge zhi cao (格致草) treatise of Xiong Mingyu (熊明遇) published in 1648 showed a printed picture of the Earth as a spherical globe, with the text stating that "the round Earth certainly has no square corners".[107] The text also pointed out that sailing ships could return to their port of origin after circumnavigating the waters of the Earth.[107] The influence of the map is distinctly Western, as traditional maps of Chinese cartography held the graduation of the sphere at 365.25 degrees, while the Western graduation was of 360 degrees. Also of interest to note is on one side of the world, there is seen towering Chinese pagodas, while on the opposite side (upside-down) there were European cathedrals.[107] The adoption of European astronomy, facilitated by the failure of indigenous astronomy to make progress, was accompanied by a sinocentric reinterpretation that declared the imported ideas Chinese in origin: European astronomy was so much judged worth consideration that numerous Chinese authors developed the idea that the Chinese of antiquity had anticipated most of the novelties presented by the missionaries as European discoveries, for example, the rotundity of the Earth and the "heavenly spherical star carrier model." Making skillful use of philology, these authors cleverly reinterpreted the greatest technical and literary works of Chinese antiquity. From this sprang a new science wholly dedicated to the demonstration of the Chinese origin of astronomy and more generally of all European science and technology.[104] Although mainstream Chinese science until the 17th century held the view that the Earth was flat, square, and enveloped by the celestial sphere, this idea was criticized by the Jin-dynasty scholar Yu Xi (fl. 307–345), who suggested that the Earth could be either square or round, in accordance with the shape of the heavens.[108] The Yuan-dynasty mathematician Li Ye (c. 1192–1279) firmly argued that the Earth was spherical, just like the shape of the heavens only smaller, since a square Earth would hinder the movement of the heavens and celestial bodies in his estimation.[109] The 17th-century Ge zhi cao treatise also used the same terminology to describe the shape of the Earth that the Eastern-Han scholar Zhang Heng (78–139 AD) had used to describe the shape of the Sun and Moon (i.e. that the former was as round as a crossbow bullet, and the latter was the shape of a ball).[110] Measurement and representation [ edit ] Geodesy, also called geodetics, is the scientific discipline that deals with the measurement and representation of the Earth, its gravitational field and geodynamic phenomena (polar motion, Earth tides, and crustal motion) in three-dimensional time-varying space. Geodesy is primarily concerned with positioning and the gravity field and geometrical aspects of their temporal variations, although it can also include the study of Earth's magnetic field. Especially in the German speaking world, geodesy is divided into geomensuration ("Erdmessung" or "höhere Geodäsie"), which is concerned with measuring the Earth on a global scale, and surveying ("Ingenieurgeodäsie"), which is concerned with measuring parts of the surface. The Earth's shape can be thought of in at least two ways; as the shape of the geoid, the mean sea level of the world ocean; or as the shape of Earth's land surface as it rises above and falls below the sea. As the science of geodesy measured Earth more accurately, the shape of the geoid was first found not to be a perfect sphere but to approximate an oblate spheroid, a specific type of ellipsoid. More recent measurements have measured the geoid to unprecedented accuracy, revealing mass concentrations beneath Earth's surface. See also [ edit ] References [ edit ] Further reading [ edit ] Media related to Spherical Earth at Wikimedia Commons
Compiling a year-end best-of list like this tends to be a multistep process. First, I ask myself which spirits jump out at me after almost a year of tastings. Second, I peruse the shelves of my liquor cabinet and look back at reviews and writeups to refresh my memory. And then, after the list is complete, I try to figure out what, if anything, the best ones have in common. This year, my list makes sense, given how nerve-wracking, traumatic, and depressing 2016 often was. Lots of whisky (Scotch) and whiskey (American), because we needed to steady our nerves with something more substantial than liqueurs or amaros. Lots of cask-strength spirits, because we needed something strong to get us through each news cycle. Lots of limited editions, perhaps to symbolize that nothing lasts forever—a good or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it. Lots of high-priced spirits, in line with the price this year exacted from all of us. But no year is just one big monochromatic downer, and, if nothing else, 2016 produced some amazing new spirits that can stand proudly alongside the cream of any other year's crop. The whiskeys came from craft distillers and big conglomerates alike. Mezcal, gin, cognac, rum, and cachaça are all represented here with exciting new expressions. For every pricey bottle on this list, there's another one under $100, and four of them are $50 or less. So take heart and stock up on these 10 delicious newbies. They helped me get through 2016, and I hope they'll get you through 2017, whatever fate decides to throw at us. Booker's Rye ($300, Limited Edition) Booker Noe, the late master distiller of Jim Beam, is best remembered today for his Booker's Bourbon, a cask-strength monster that helped usher in a new age of American whiskey when it was first released, in the late '80s. In 2003, a year before Noe's death, he laid down 100 barrels of a rye whiskey that was unlike anything he'd ever done before. Standard Jim Beam rye is only barely a legal blend, meaning it has just over 51% rye content in the mash bill (corn and barley make up the rest). We're not sure exactly what Booker's Rye consists of, but we know it's more than 70% rye, which makes it a bigger, spicier whiskey. After letting it age 13 years in the barrel, Fred Noe, Booker's son and Beam's current master distiller, bottled the whole batch—which, after the angels took their share via evaporation, is likely fewer than 10,000 bottles. Hence the hefty price. If you're a rye fan, though, it's worth every penny. Bottled at cask strength—a shade over 136 proof—you'd think it would singe your nose hairs on contact, but it's surprisingly palatable and complex, even without water. The flavor is robust, kicking off with dry oak and leather and balanced out by rich, sweet dark fruits, particularly cherries. Cinnamon and tobacco come through on the finish, which is very, very long and spicy. It's almost a shame Booker's Rye is so good, because there's no more left and no exact recipe for how to make it. Even if Fred Noe gives it a shot, it won't be ready for another 13 years. In other words, stock up on this one while you can, price be damned. Find Booker's Rye online here » Novo Fogo Graciosa Cachaça ($35) The Rio Olympics made 2016 the summer of cachaça, a Brazilian sugarcane-based spirit. Known largely as a fiery, rougher-hewn cousin of rum, cachaça is drunk stateside in the caipirinha—a version of a mojito that's more citrus-forward and less sweet. Until recently, almost all cachaça available in the US was un-aged and, to American palates used to light rums, rather harsh-tasting. But aged cachaça has started to make its way here in the last few years, and Novo Fogo deserves a medal for its Graciosa expression. Aged for two years in used American oak barrels and finished for another 18 months in native Brazilian wood barrels (made from the castanheira do pará, or Brazil nut tree), it's tamer than the un-aged stuff, but its depth and complexity more than make up for that. It has a distinct custard-with-cherries vibe up front, the bright fruit intertwined with sweet vanilla. Along the way, the tannins from the wood take over, and dry oak and bitter chocolate come to the fore. The finish is long and multidimensional, with hints of oak, coffee, and anise. Aged cachaça is so different from the un-aged stuff that trying Graciosa is like tasting a whole new spirit. The next few years promise to be fascinating ones for the category; here's a great way to get in on the ground floor. Find Novo Fogo Graciosa Cachaça online here » Hennessy Master Blender's Selection No. 1 Cognac ($80, Limited Edition) In Hennessy's 251 years as a producer of cognac, it's had exactly eight master blenders. Yann Fillioux is the seventh. He's officially handed over the reins to number eight—his nephew, Renaud Fillioux de Gironde—but, after more than 50 years in the family business (the Fillioux clan makes the cognac, the Hennessy family sells it), he's not quite ready to call it quits. Which is how Master Blender's Selection No. 1 came about. Much of a master blender's job involves creating historically consistent cognacs. A Hennessy VSOP, for instance, needs to taste like the VSOP Hennessy drinkers have come to expect over years, decades, and even centuries. Master Blender's Selection No. 1 is what happens when Fillioux has the freedom to create a blend in his own style. This isn't your typical cognac: The bottle and label are more reminiscent of bourbon packaging, and the higher proof (86, while almost all other cognacs are 80) gives it a little more spicy zing. And the blend itself—more than 80 eaux de vie, aged between four and 16 years in casks of varying ages—is a fruity, full-bodied beauty that will tickle your taste buds, whether or not you're a cognac enthusiast. It opens round and creamy, coating the tongue with rich notes of almonds, plump grapes, ripe plums, and sweet melon. It follows up with tart apricot, before finishing with a spicy tingle and a woody, leathery afterglow. Master Blender's Selection No. 1 would probably taste great in cocktails, but it's such a perfect sipper that it seems almost a shame to dilute it. And, since this is a one-time-only creation, perhaps it's better to parcel it out more sparingly. Find Hennessy Master Blender's Selection No. 1 Cognac online here » Midleton Dair Ghaelach Irish Whiskey ($270) Irish whiskey has had a renaissance in the last few years, with sales exploding (it was the fastest-growing spirits category in the US in 2014), new distilleries opening, and lots of noteworthy expressions coming out. Midleton, which was founded almost 200 years ago, has a portfolio that includes some of Ireland's best and best-known whiskeys, including Jameson, Redbreast, and Green Spot. For Dair Ghaelach, the distillery used some of its finest stocks, aged 15 to 22 years in American ex-bourbon barrels, then finished them for about a year in new Irish oak—the only Irish whiskey to use native oak. Irish oak has a different makeup from its American counterpart, and releases more of certain chemicals, most notably vanillins, into the whiskey. The result is a luscious blend of rich vanilla, banana, toffee, dark chocolate, and honey, with a fair amount of spice from the long aging time. The lingering finish conjures crème brûlée, with creamy vanilla overlaid with burnt caramel. At almost 58% alcohol by volume, it's not quite a dessert in a glass, but it's just as satisfying. Midleton promises to make as much Dair Ghaelach as limited supplies of Irish oak will allow; in the meantime, for the benefit of future generations of imbibers, it's planting more trees. Find Midleton Dair Ghaelach Irish Whiskey online here » Plantation O.F.T.D. Overproof Dark Rum ($25/1 Liter) Overproof rum is usually consumed in cocktails (except in Jamaica, that is, where it's an everyday drink). But this is no ordinary overproof rum. Plantation's rum master, Alexandre Gabriel, handpicked a dream team of boozy luminaries to come up with this blend, among them historian/author/punchmaster David Wondrich; tiki scholar Jeff "Beachbum" Berry, who owns Latitude 29 in New Orleans; and Paul McGee, owner of Chicago tiki mecca Lost Lake. Plantation sources its rums from all over the Caribbean, so the group had a lot of raw material to work with. They finally settled on a blend of rums from Guyana, Jamaica, and Barbados. The group, rumor has it, cried en masse, "Oh f*%#, that's delicious!" when the perfect blend was reached—hence the O.F.T.D. name. Officially, at least, it now stands for "Old Fashioned Traditional Dark." You may think, "Wow, that's strong!" on first whiff. But if you can make it past the 138-proof blast, you'll experience a sublime rum, dark and woody and even a little smoky, with cinnamon, baking spices, and brown sugar coming to the fore. Overripe, slightly funky tropical fruits, notably banana, sneak in mid-palate, followed by a long, spicy, and slightly bittersweet finish. If the alcohol is simply too much for you, try it in a fruity rum Old Fashioned with bitters, a sugar cube, muddled orange and cherry, and plenty of ice. Or, better yet, whip up an extra-strength Mai Tai. Before long, you too will be saying, "O.F.T.D.!" Find Plantation O.F.T.D. Overproof Dark Rum online here » Highland Park Ice Edition Single Malt Scotch Whisky ($300, Limited Edition) Highland Park's 18 Year Old expression is rightly hailed as a classic single malt; Spirit Journal founder F. Paul Pacult has on multiple occasions named it the best spirit in the world. But this year, Highland Park found a way to top itself. Ice Edition comes in a mountain-shaped green- and blue-tinted bottle, encased in a wooden ark. The inspiration for the whisky supposedly comes from a Norse myth about ice giants battling the gods. (Vikings once inhabited the Orkney Islands, where Highland Park is made, though they were long gone by the time whisky was invented.) It's all a little bit silly, but the whisky is no joke. Aged at least 17 years, it's bottled at cask strength—53.9% alcohol by volume—which makes the flavors jump out on the palate, like 3-D compared to the lower-proof 18's flat-screen. Vanilla and pineapple morph into spicy ginger and intense smoke. The saga concludes with a staggeringly long finish, woody and spicy, with hints of anise. This is a dram for the ages, though, sadly, it'll be with us for a limited time only; fewer than 4,000 bottles were made. If you love Scotch whisky, $300 will seem like a bargain for this one. And if you miss out, its sibling Fire Edition is just hitting stores now. Find Highland Park Ice Edition Single Malt Scotch Whisky online here » The Revivalist Botanical Gin, Summertide Expression ($36) It's amazing that, until around the turn of the millennium, American gins were few and far between. Today, the colonies are rivaling Mother England in making new and exciting gins, many with locally sourced botanicals. One of the new kids on the block is The Revivalist, in Chester County, Pennsylvania. It's come out with four gins, each containing seasonally appropriate botanicals—cinnamon and clove in the autumnal Harvest Expression, for example. There's not a dud in the bunch, but the best of the four is Summertide. Unlike with many modern American gins, you can actually taste the juniper. Unlike classic London Dry gins, however, juniper shares the spotlight here with other botanicals, including lemon peel, jasmine, rose, and peppermint. It's soft, floral, and cooling—perfect for a warm-weather gin and tonic or martini, or by itself on the rocks. Though it has a summertime vibe, Summertide Expression is delicious year-round. Find The Revivalist Botanical Gin, Summertide Expression online here » Berkshire Mountain Distillers Two Lanterns American Whiskey ($120, Limited Edition) Whiskey starts its life as beer, or at least something close to it. In fact, the fermented, undistilled product that comes from the first steps of whiskey-making is called "distiller's beer." It's not really drinkable, and, of course, it doesn't have hops. But several years ago, a few intrepid distillers wondered what would happen if they distilled whiskey from actual finished beer. American craft distillers, like Charbay and Seven Stills, have produced some excellent beer-based whiskeys. In Scotland, Glenfiddich has gotten in on the act with its excellent India Pale Ale Cask Finished expression. The Massachusetts-based Berkshire Mountain Distillers has been working with neighboring brewery Samuel Adams, along with other craft brewers, for a few years now. Two Lanterns, the first whiskey to use Sam Adams' flagship Boston Lager, is a crowning achievement for both brands. Triple-distilled from Boston Lager and aged for more than four years, it tastes like, well, what it is—the concentrated essence of a classic brew—while remaining light and lively on the palate. It's quite sweet and fruity, coming on strong with pine, lychee, and melon before dry hops and barley move to the fore. The finish is a short and perfect sweet/dry combination. You don't have to be a beer drinker to love this whiskey. Find Berkshire Mountain Distillers Two Lanterns American Whiskey online here » Creyente Mezcal ($50) Now that mezcal has gained a toehold in the US spirits market, manufacturers of the stuff seem to be doing their best to dumb it down, eliminating its earthy, somewhat funky, intensely smoky flavor and making it taste more like its refined sibling, tequila. If you need a quick primer, the big distinctions between tequila and mezcal are that tequila is distilled solely from Blue Weber agave, while mezcal uses many different varieties, and tequila distilleries steam the agave to release its juices, while mezcaleros roast it, giving it a very different flavor profile. Of course, we don't need a mezcal that tastes like tequila when there's already plenty of excellent tequila out there for the drinking. Fortunately, the folks at Jose Cuervo realized that when creating the company's first-ever US-released mezcal. It's a blend of two separate mezcals made in two different regions of Mexico—Tlacolula, where the soil is richer, and the mountainous region of Yautepec. Both use Espadin agave, the agave most commonly found in mezcal. After distillation, the mezcals are blended together and cut with water down to 80 proof (like most mezcals, Creyente isn't aged). The result is a perfect balance of smooth and smoky, with hints of lemony citrus, cashew, and sweet grains underneath mesquite smoke. The finish is surprisingly clean, with hints of smoke sticking around but not setting off any fire alarms. If you want to know what a classic mezcal tastes like, Creyente is a great place for a novice to start, and a fun place for an expert to wind up. Find Creyente Mezcal online here » Macallan 12 Year Old Double Cask Scotch Single Malt Whisky ($65) Given the boom in American whiskey and corresponding decline in Scotch single malt sales over the last couple of years, it's no surprise that some Scotch whiskies are trying to affect a more bourbon-like flavor. Dewar's Scratched Cask, Auchentoshan American Oak, and The Glenrothes Bourbon Cask Reserve are a few examples of the category. But tasty though they are, if it's bourbon you want, it's better just to buy a bottle of bourbon, right? So it was easy to be a little cynical about The Macallan's latest gambit, Double Cask, for which its 12-year-old whisky is aged in new American oak (as bourbon is aged) as well as traditional European sherry casks. And the result is, unexpectedly, a tremendous whisky. While the standard 12-year-old can feel a tad heavy, the American oak brings lighter flavors to the mix, balancing out the orange peel and raisin influence of the sherry with vanilla, caramel, and hints of banana and honey. It glides to a spicy finish, with black pepper, leather, and oak on the back of the palate. The Double Cask actually improves on a classic whisky that didn't seem to need improving. Here's hoping we'll see more Double Cask expressions from The Macallan down the road. Find Macallan 12 Year Old Double Cask Scotch Single Malt Whisky online here » This post may contain links to Amazon or other partners; your purchases via these links can benefit Serious Eats. Read more about our affiliate linking policy.
Judge denies new trial for daycare worker in toddler’s death Melissa Calusinski, incarcerated since 2009 for murdering a toddler, will not get a new trial, an appellate court has ruled. \| Sun-Times file photo WAUKEGAN — A Lake County judge on Friday denied a motion seeking a new trial for a daycare worker who is serving a 31-year sentence in the 2009 death of a Deerfield toddler. Attorneys for Melissa Calusinski had hoped that what they said were newly discovered X-rays would cast doubt on the conviction of their client in the death of Benjamin Kingan. In a three-day hearing, they had offered testimony that the X-rays provided to defense attorneys at trial — X-rays which purported to show that the toddler had suffered a skull fracture — had been made illegible on purpose. Judge Daniel Shanes didn’t see things that way, and said there were no “new” X-rays. “The evidence is clear now that there was never a second set of X-rays,” Shanes said in issuing his ruling Friday morning. “Without a second set of X-rays, much of the defense’s claim falls apart like a house of cards.” Calusinski’s attorney, Kathleen Zellner, called the 50-page ruling “riddled with errors.” Judge Shanes rejected the defense’s “sensational claim” that the new set of X-rays of Benjamin’s head had come to light last year. Shanes said it’s clear from the evidence that those 2015 images are the same ones given to defense attorneys back in September 2011, but in a different file format. And if there are differences in quality between the two sets, defense attorneys were given software in 2011 that would have allowed them to manipulate the images, Shanes said. “The court finds that the images from … June 2015 could not reasonably be taken to put the whole case in such a different light as to undermine confidence in the original trial verdict,” Shanes wrote in his ruling. Shanes also disputed Calusinksi’s father’s claim that he learned about the second set of X-rays from an anonymous tipster to his cell phone. Shanes said cell phone records don’t support the claim. “The court appreciates that Mr. Calusinski would likely do or say anything to help his daughter,” Shanes wrote. But, he also noted that if the defense attorney from the original trial were concerned about the quality of the copied X-rays, he could have simply looked at the originals in the coroner’s office. There had been conflicting evidence about Benjamin’s death presented at trial, but presenting more conflicting evidence now was not enough to order a new trial, Shanes said, noting that the prosecution’s case had not been dependent alone on the existence of a skull fracture. Benjamin’s parents attended the hearing. They left the courthouse without comment. Calusinski’s attorney, Kathleen Zellner, said she was not surprised by the ruling. “I totally expected it,” Zellner said. “We’re in Lake County. They’ve had a whole series of wrongful convictions. They never admit they’re wrong.” Zellner held a news conference at a nearby hotel after the hearing. She was joined by Calusinski’s father, Paul Calusinski. They, along with about two dozen other supporters, wore black t-shirts with white lettering: “Free Melissa” on the front, “Justice Denied” on the back. “We will not stop until she gets out,” said Paul Calusinski, who choked up at one point and had difficulty speaking. “She’s doing time for no crime.” Defense attorneys had said more legible X-rays of Benjamin’s skull were discovered by Lake County Coroner Thomas Rudd in June 2015. Zellner believed they proved that the 16-month-old did not suffer a skull fracture, as the prosecution told the jury — 32 times — at Calusinski’s trial. At a pre-trial hearing in 2011, lead prosecutor Christen Bishop, who is now a Lake County judge, told Shanes that the three X-Rays taken of the boy were “not readable or legible.” During a nine-hour interrogation, Calusinski had confessed to intentionally slamming the boy’s head to the ground, though she initially had denied — at least 79 times, over six hours — having anything to do with Benjamin’s death. Forensic pathologist Manny Montez had, at trial, testified that what he found was “significant trauma, violent trauma to the head.” Defense attorneys had argued at trial that Benjamin had a pre-existing injury from a bump on the head, but then the final blow came when he threw himself back in a tantrum at the daycare center on the day he died. Contributing: Ruth Fuller
The Obama administration has issued new guidelines that could make it harder for governors who deny climate change to obtain federal disaster-preparedness funds. The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s new rules could put some Republican governors in a bind. The rules say that states’ risk assessments must include “consideration of changing environmental or climate conditions that may affect and influence the long-term vulnerability from hazards in the state.” The policy, which goes into effect in March 2016, doesn’t affect federal money for relief after a hurricane, flood, or other natural disaster. But states seeking disaster preparedness money from Washington will be required to assess how climate change threatens their communities, a requirement that wasn’t included in FEMA’s 2008 guidelines. FEMA said it “recognizes there exists inherent uncertainty about future conditions, and will work with states to identify tools and approaches that enable decision-making to reduce risks and increase resilience from a changing climate.” “An understanding of vulnerabilities will assist with prioritizing mitigation actions and policies that reduce risk from future events,” the agency said. Among the GOP governors who could face a difficult decision are Rick Scott of Florida, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Chris Christie of New Jersey, Pat McCrory of North Carolina and Greg Abbott of Texas. PHOTOS: Shocking celebrity breakups Copyright © 2019 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.
Please enable Javascript to watch this video RICHMOND, Va. (WTVR)--A Richmond prosecutor is being challenged as a judicial nominee, because of his advocacy for gay rights. When the General Assembly meets on Monday, lawmakers will vote to appoint several judges. It's not usually a process that creates a lot of buzz, but this time around it is. Delegate Bob Marshall said he will seek to remove the name of Richmond prosecutor Tracy Thorne-Begland from a list of proposed District Court judicial appointments. “I don't even think it's proper to put his name forward because of his behavior,” said Marshall, who called Thorne-Begland “a homosexual activist,” in a press release. Thorne-Begland has been nominated to serve as a judge for Richmond’s General District Court, but, Marshall challenges the nomination on the grounds of the prosecutor's sexual orientation. "We have a constitution which says marriage is between one man and one woman and if he's taking an oath, he has to uphold and defend that as a judge,” said Marshall. “If his lifestyle is exactly contrary to that… I don't see how he could do that,” he said. Thorne-Begland lives with a partner and they have two children. "I don't know why the folks on the courts committee didn't catch this before...but they didn't...but it's up to us to act as a backstop,” said Marshall, whose request has so far been denied by House Republican leadership. Thorne-Begland was one of the early, prominent challengers to the military’s former “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” regulation. He served as a Navy aviation lieutenant and was discharged once he disclosed his sexual orientation on national television. Marshall said that such gay rights advocacy is okay while serving in an elected capacity, but not as a judge--which calls for one to be impartial. "I think it's unfortunate, said Democratic Senator Donald McEachin.”Tracy fought for this country.” More than 20 years ago, Thorne-Begland graduated at the top of his class from Navy flight school in Pensacola, Fla. McEachin said Thorne-Begland's sponsor in the Senate and says that Marshall is ignoring the prosecutor's record. “Bob just has a phobia...that's the real problem,” said McEachin. McEachin went on to say Thorne-Begland is no different from the other nominees. “Everyone has a background who comes onto the bench, but, we select judges to be able to put aside their backgrounds, to put aside whatever personal passions they have to be a judge,” said McEachin.
I started feeling nostalgia at a young age. It is a sentiment usually reserved for older people, but moving twice during my childhood made me prone to nostalgia in my early teenage years. Passing by an old house would trigger memories of the place: scents, tastes, activities, and friends. Moving so often helped me see time in a more concrete way, given the brutal sense of change repeatedly forced upon me. I’d get to a new place and life would be different, never to be the same again. Everything I loved -and hated- about my old home was gone. It became time for new friends, new projects, new goals, new successes, and new failures Like anyone that played them in their early years, I attribute a good number of my memories to videogames. Whether it was finally receiving Warcraft II (1995) as a gift for Christmas, or finding the Master Sword in A Link to the Past (1991), games became an integral part of my past, and how I remember it. Being such a young medium –even more so back then– videogames have evolved extremely fast. Warcraft II does not make sense anymore (why would you not be able to select more than nine units at the same time?), and finding the Master Sword could only achieve this sense of gravitas today if it were in three dimensions with a touch of lens flare shining on the blade. We are one of the early generations that lived their childhood with videogames. If you are searching for a reason why there are so many remakes and remasters of old games appearing on the market these past few years, this is it. Gaming is not the same as it used to be and aging players often long for the “good old days.” Not only were games different back then, but they also constituted most of my free time. I used to have time to get lost in games; now they’re breaks between daily chores.
Longtime Hitler enthusiast and Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel was released from a German prison on Monday after serving five years for the crime of inciting racial hatred. Zundel, who turns 71 next month, said he would be heading to his home in the Black Forest to regain his health. “It’s kind of a sad situation,” he told The Associated Press as a small group of supporters greeted him outside a Mannheim prison. Thus ends a long legal saga that began in 1977 when the German-born Zundel founded a small publishing house in Canada called Samisdat Publishers. He published books such as The Hitler We Loved and Why (which he co-authored under a pseudonym) and Did Six Million Really Die? and distributed Nazi and neo-Nazi posters, audiotapes and other items. Among the countries where Zundel sent his offerings was Germany, which has laws prohibiting Holocaust denial and dissemination of Nazi and neo-Nazi material. It also was during the 1970s that Zundel was spokesman for Concerned Parents of German Descent, a group that contended that German Canadians and their children were discriminated against by anti-German stereotyping. Zundel even issued press releases protesting NBC’s “Holocaust” miniseries for its portrayal of Germans. And yet Toronto Sun columnist Mark Bonokoski reported that Zundel’s maternal grandparents were Jewish. Bonokoski also wrote that one of Zundel’s ex-wives told him that Zundel was concerned enough about his lineage that he returned to Germany in the 1960s in search of his family’s Nazi-era certificate of pure Aryan blood, but could find no such document. Zundel lived in Canada for more than 40 years, although he was a German citizen. He was tried twice there in the 1980s on criminal charges of using the mail to send hate propaganda. His conviction at his first trial was overturned on a legal technicality. His conviction at the second trial was also overturned when Canada’s Supreme Court ruled that the charge on which he was convicted was unconstitutional. In the late 1990s, Zundel was investigated anew by Canadian authorities, this time for promoting hatred against Jews on his website. In 2000, he moved to Sevierville, Tenn., and married a fellow Holocaust denier named Ingrid Rimland (who had run Zundel’s website for years). Three years later, he was arrested for violating U.S. immigration rules as he applied for citizenship and deported to Germany to face charges there. Zundel tried to thwart the Germans by seeking refugee status in Canada. Twice denied citizenship in Canada, his permanent residency status had expired after his move to Tennessee. A judge denied his bid to remain in the country, saying he was a national security threat. Zundel’s trial in Germany lurched along, delayed when two of his attorneys were kicked off the case because of their own far-right, anti-Semitic views. He was eventually convicted and sentenced to the maximum of five years in prison. Canada Public Safety Minister Vic Toews on Tuesday made it clear that Zundel can forget about returning to that country should he long to leave the Black Forest. “In 2005, a Federal Court judge confirmed that Zundel is inadmissible on security grounds for being a danger to the security of Canada,” Toews said in a statement. “The decision reinforced the government of Canada’s position that this country will not be a safe haven for individuals who pose a risk to Canada’s national security.”
With Kris Medlen fully recovered from Tommy John surgery, he entered the 2012 season as part of a revamped Braves bullpen set on reducing the workload of Atlanta's three-headed monster of O'Flaherty, Venters and Kimbrel. The plan worked, but when Brandon Beachy was lost to elbow surgery and Jair Jurrjens was struggling, the starting rotation needed help. That's where Kris Medlen came in. Medlen posted a 3.49 ERA in his first 21 games out of the Braves bullpen, most of the damage coming in May when he surrendered nine runs in 15.2 innings. At that time, he was sent to the minors for two weeks to stretch out for a potential starting role. Upon his return in mid-June, he stayed in the bullpen for 26 more innings, allowing just three runs until he finally received the call to make his first start July 31 against the visiting Marlins. Beast mode was initiated. In his 12 starts, Medlen laid waste to opposing hitters, holding them to a .191 batting average and a .483 OPS; his teammates backed him up by winning each of those starts. With each win, Medlen and the Braves continued a trend that began in 2009, all the while approaching a major-league record shared by hall-of-famers Carl Hubbell and Whitey Ford of 22 straight wins in their starts. The record ultimately fell when the Braves won Medlen's 23rd straight start on September 30. 2012 also saw the first two complete games of Medlen's career: first, a five-hit shutout August 16 against the Padres and a 12-strikeout performance of a 6-1 win over the Rockies September 3, both in front of his home crowd. The 12 strikeouts set a career high before he eclipsed that mark just two starts later with 13 in seven innings against the first-place Nationals. Only once in those 12 starts did Medlen allow more than two runs and never did he issue more than two walks. For those final two months, Kris Medlen was the best starting pitcher in baseball. Here are a few of his numbers compared to some of this year's Cy Young Award candidates over their final 12 starts. W-L ERA WHIP vs. OPS Walks K/BB Kris Medlen 9-0 0.97 0.80 .483 10 8.40 Clayton Kershaw 7-3 1.55 0.93 .537 25 3.72 Justin Verlander 6-2 2.83 1.27 .662 24 3.88 R.A. Dickey 6-4 2.58 1.09 .672 21 3.95 Jered Weaver 7-4 3.70 1.12 .671 19 2.79 David Price 7-1 2.44 0.99 .557 16 5.31 The complete-game shutout was part of 34.2-inning scoreless streak, bested only by Greg Maddux (39.1 innings) as a Braves pitcher. That streak helped Medlen win NL Pitcher of the Month for August. His 12 and 13-strikeout games earned him repeat honors for September. He was the first Braves pitcher to repeat as NL Pitcher of the Month since...you guessed it, Maddux. Medlen was also the first Braves pitcher to record eight called strikeouts in a game since Maddux did it in September 2000. During his dominant run, Medlen would be frequently compared to Maddux. In addition to the above notes, Chipper Jones stated after Medlen's 13-strikeout game that Medlen displayed similar intelligence and poise as well as the same devastating changeup. According to Fangraphs, opposing hitters hit a measly .087 against Medlen's changeup. Medlen was undeniably the staff ace the final two months of the season, and that made him the ideal candidate to start the inaugural Wild Card play-in game. Expecting this same kind of production over a full 162-game stretch next year would be expecting too much (right? RIGHT??), but there's no question Medlen will be in Atlanta's starting rotation in 2013.
Editor's Note: This article originally appeared on Aug. 20 at the website of Other Words, which publishes progressive editorials and offers them to newspapers around the country. David Barton, a self-styled Christian historian who claims to debunk left-wing myths about America, is sure of it: If you studied the Founding Fathers like he has, you would know that "as far as they were concerned, they had already had the entire debate on creationism and evolution." And the creationists, Barton says, won. Just one little problem: Charles Darwin's On the Origin of the Species, the founding text of the theory of evolution, wasn't published until 1859. That's, oh, about three-quarters of a century after the founders were active. The very same day that Barton offered up his unique view of creationism — a term that was first applied to American fundamentalist beliefs only in 1929 — he told his interviewer that most of the founders were abolitionists, even if George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and many others were slaveholders. "That's why we said we want to separate from Britain, so we can end slavery," he said. Hmmm. That was awfully noble of them. Except for one thing: The British were way out front of the Americans on this. In 1807, Parliament outlawed the slave trade in the British Empire. In subsequent years, it pressured other European nations to end or curtail the trade. In 1833, Britain abolished slavery completely. We Americans finally did so in 1865. That was 32 years after the British, which is kind of strange if you believe David Barton's fairy tales. Why does any of this matter? It matters because, sad to say, Barton matters — or at least he did, until the conservative Thomas Nelson Publishers yanked his tendentious but best-selling book, The Jefferson Lies, earlier this month. Despite the fact that he has no academic training in history or related fields at all, Barton has become the go-to man for much of the religious far right — an ideologue who claims that the separation of church and state is a "myth" and that the Founding Fathers actually were building an explicitly Christian nation. Prominent politicians like former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, and Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann think he's brilliant. He's not brilliant. He's not a historian. But he is a right-wing bigot. That became indisputable in the last month, a very bad period for the man described by conspiracy-monger Glenn Beck as "the most important man in America." Viewers of the History Channel voted The Jefferson Lies, which depicts the man who actually endorsed a wall between church and state as an enthusiast of America as a "Christian nation," "the least credible history book in print." Ten conservative Christian professors denounced its totally unsupported claims. An NPR story obliterated his assertion that the Constitution quoted the Bible. Then his Christian publishing house said it had "lost confidence in the book's details." There's more. Barton believes that gay people should be sent to prison. He claims that the Muslim Brotherhood has infiltrated the government at all levels. He insists, based on nothing but his own highly unusual reading of the Bible, that environmentalism, the graduated income tax, the minimum wage, deficit spending, unions, and measures to battle global warming are all opposed by God. In Texas, he worked to strip Martin Luther King Jr. from high school history textbooks. No one is saying David Barton can't make whatever reckless and false claims he wants. He's as protected by the First Amendment as any of us. But that doesn't mean that he has to be taken seriously, given a podium, or boosted as a must-read "historian," as Huckabee called him. Let's finally consign Barton's propaganda to the slag heap of baseless and obnoxious ideas where it belongs, and get on with a serious debate about the future of our troubled country.
BIT.TRIP Runner2 review: moving forward If the first BIT.TRIP Runner was a confectionery treat, then Runner2 is simply the same treat with a different flavor. Both play similarly, but Runner2 takes everything about the first game that worked and added modern ideas without compromising what made it so much fun in the first place. The BIT.TRIP series, from indie developer Gaijin Games, is fondly remembered for bringing a retro aesthetic and nostalgic gameplay style to modern-day players. The series' conclusion looked to be the last players would see of its hero, Commander Video, but you can't keep a good mascot down. Commander Video is back, surprisingly leaving behind the series' hallmark visual style. This change turns out to be for the best, as BIT.TRIP Presents Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien pushes the series forward, while retaining the mechanics that made the original BIT.TRIP Runner so much fun. The basic idea for Runner2 is the same as its predecessor. Commander Video treks across 2D courses in an autorunner setting. Players must avoid obstacles by jumping, sliding, and kicking their way through, often to the beat of the background music, until they reach the end goal. Hitting an obstacle takes players back to the previous checkpoint for them to start again, with no lives system in place. It's as simple to pick up and play as the first game, though this is where the similarities end. Anyone that has played the original will immediately notice that the production values for Runner2 are far beyond what they were before. There's a narrative, albeit a minimal one, that plays out through cutscenes reminiscent of classic cartoons. There's even a narrator, as Charles Martinet steps out of his Mario role and reels off the story of Commander Video sounding like someone trying out for Rocky & Bullwinkle. It's a joy to listen to, thanks to the infectious enthusiasm that Martinet brings to the table. While the cutscenes are a reminder of the past, the aesthetic of the game's individual stages are fully modernized. Gone is the pixelated art style of the first game and in its place is a modernized 3D world. Characters, enemies, and backgrounds are fully rendered, making Commander Video look less like an Atari character and more like a Pixar creation. The chiptune soundtrack has been replaced with a more modern style, as pianos and jazz riffs make up the bulk of the game's music. None of these changes diminish the gameplay, but rather give the feeling that the series has moved forward. The improved visuals also allow for new gameplay mechanics that would not have been possible with the old art style, all in the name of scoring. For example, loop-de-loops prompt players to shine a light on Commander Video using the right analog stick for higher scores, while cornered loops have players tap face buttons to the beat. Other additions include rails, in which players pop themselves above or hang below in order to avoid enemies. These are ideas that not only look smooth, thanks to the new visuals, but also feel like they fit the overall tone of the game. That's not to say the new modern style is perfect. The minimalist presentation of the first Runner allowed players to focus on the beat and on upcoming obstacles. Runner2's animated backgrounds sometimes work to its detriment. For example, I played through a stage in the third world ("The Supernature") that featured a giant Bigfoot emerge in the background to run simultaneously with Commander Video. It was a clever addition, but proved to be distracting, as my split-focus would send me barreling into a wall. Runner2's visuals are gorgeous, but can sometimes lead to players taking their eye off the ball. Runner2's level design has also undergone a modernization. Linear progression has been replaced with a world map, featuring several unlockable levels that contain bonuses, like outfits and new characters. The requirements for opening these new stages do not feel overly challenging, so they're ones that often feel worth aiming for. Individual stages also contain branching paths, where players will need to decide on-the-spot which way to turn. Those decisions can lead to more difficult paths, alternate exits, or cartridges that warp players to the old-school Pitfall-style stages that were such a big hit in the first Runner. As players progress through each world, they'll also find a giant key that will open special chests laying about in certain stages. This adds a new incentive to revisit many of Runner2's stages, adding replay value that goes beyond simply trying to beat your highest score. If the first BIT.TRIP Runner was a confectionery treat, then Runner2 is simply the same treat with a different flavor. Both play similarly, but Runner2 takes everything about the first game that worked and added modern ideas without compromising what made it so much fun in the first place. Beginners and BIT.TRIP fans alike will have a lot to love about this bold new step for the series. This BIT.TRIP Runner2 review was based on a digital PC version of the game provided by the developer. The game will also be available on PS3, PS Vita, Xbox 360, Wii U, OS X, and Linux. A description of the differences between platform versions can be found here.
Flamingo Field was a ballpark at the corner of 15th Street and Michigan Avenue[1] in Miami Beach, Florida home to Miami Beach minor-league clubs and the spring training home of the New York Giants in 1934 and 1935, the Philadelphia Phillies from 1940 to 1942, and again in 1946, and the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1947. Capacity was approximately 3,000 for baseball. The center field fence was 386 feet from homeplate.[2] The park was also referred to as "Flamingo Park" which is also the name of the area in which it was located. Flamingo Field was home to the Class D Florida East Coast League Miami Tigers in 1940, who changed their nickname to the Miami Beach Flamingos in 1941 and won the League championship that year. The FECL folded in May 1942 due to World War II. After the War, the Flamingos joined the new Class C Florida International League in 1946. The Flamingos played the 1952 season, sat-out 1953, and rejoined in 1954 only to move across Biscayne Bay to Miami during the 1954 season. In addition to baseball, the field was used for multiple purposes. Duquesne practiced at Flamingo Field in December 1936 prior to the 1937 Orange Bowl.[3] The Georgia Bulldogs football team practiced at Flamingo Field in December 1941 prior to the 1942 Orange Bowl[4] in which they defeated TCU. When the Phillies held spring training at the ballpark in 1942, box seats cost $1.65, the grandstand was $1.10, and bleacher seats $0.55.[5] In 1956, the field was rundown but was being used by the Miami Beach and St. Patrick's high school baseball teams.
#OmaHogs SWEEP Stillwater Regional Box Score \| Super Regional Ticket Information STILLWATER, Okla. – The No. 2 seed Arkansas Razorbacks (38-22) earned a 4-3 win over No. 4 seed St. John’s (41-16) to sweep the Stillwater Regional and advance to the Super Regional round of the NCAA Tournament. The Razorbacks will take on Missouri State next weekend. The NCAA will announce Super Regional locations, dates, times and television information on Monday night. With the game tied 3-3 in the top of the ninth inning, the Razorbacks manufactured a run to take the lead and the Stillwater Regional title. Brett McAfee got the rally started with his third hit of the night and Michael Bernal followed with a single. With the bases loaded and one down, Joe Serrano hit a chopper to the left side that scored McAfee to make it a 4-3 game. Zach Jackson came out of the bullpen in the bottom of the ninth and struck out the side to earn his second save of the weekend and send Arkansas to Super Regionals. Jackson Lowery, starting just the third game of his career, retired the first 11 hitters and tied his career high with five-plus innings pitched. The right-hander allowed just one hit, one run and struck out three in the no-decision. McAfee and Bernal also began the Razorback rally in the fifth when the duo led off the frame with singles. Tucker Pennell and Joe Serrano both drove in runs to give Arkansas an early 2-0 lead. The NCAA Regional title is Arkansas’ fourth in the past seven years and its sixth Super Regional appearance since the format began in 1999. The Razorbacks last won an NCAA Regional in 2012 when Arkansas went on to win the Waco Super Regional and advance to the College World Series. Serrano earned the regional’s Most Outstanding Player award after batting .500 (6-for-12) with a double, two runs scored and two RBIs, including the game-winning RBI against St. John’s. Five other Razorbacks were named to the Stillwater Regional All-Tournament Team: Michael Bernal, Tyler Spoon, Andrew Benintendi, Jackson Lowery and Zach Jackson. Stillwater Regional All-Tournament Team: SS – Michael Bernal (4-for-10, 2 runs, 2 RBIs) OF – Joe Serrano* (6-for-12, 2B, 2 runs, 2 RBIs) OF – Tyler Spoon (5-for-12, HR, 2 2Bs, 3 runs, 4 RBIs) OF – Andrew Benintendi (4-for-11, 2B, 3 runs, 2 RBIs) P – Jackson Lowery (1-0, 7.0 IP, 2 hits, 1 ER, 5 Ks) P – Zach Jackson (2 SVs, 4.0 IP, 1 hit, 0 ER, 10 Ks) * Most Outstanding Player Game Notes: • Arkansas advances to its fourth Super Regional in the last seven years. • The Razorbacks have swept their regional for the fourth time in eight years. • Arkansas improves to 69-58 all-time in the NCAA Tournament and 51-39 in NCAA Regional action. • The Razorbacks are in the midst of their 28th NCAA Tournament in program history, including the 14th consecutive. • Arkansas has won two Super Regionals in the last seven years, advancing to the College World Series in 2009 and 2012. • The Razorbacks have won 13 of their past 17 games away from home. • Michael Bernal extended his career-long hitting streak to 13 games with his 10th multi-hit game. • Joe Serrano delivered his 17th multi-hit game and a team-high 64th of his career. • Tyler Spoon added his 20th multi-hit game, 20th double and sixth home run of the season. • Brett McAfee had his third three-hit game of the year. • Zach Jackson claimed his eighth save and second in as many games. • Jackson struck out 10 of the 12 batters he retired in the Stillwater Regional. Super Regional Ticket Information: The NCAA will not award hosting sites or announce dates for the Super Regionals until late Monday evening (approximately 10 p.m. Central). The Arkansas Razorbacks have put in a bid to host Super Regionals at Baum Stadium and are hopeful to be selected. On Monday from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Central, season ticket holders and Razorback Foundation members will be able to request Super Regional tickets through their online account. Foundation Members and Season Ticket Holders that previously requested tickets will receive their order via email on Tuesday morning. If the Razorbacks are awarded a Super Regional on Monday evening, the Razorback Ticket Center will be prepared to make all-session tickets available to the public on Tuesday morning. All-session passes, which include tickets to all games of the best-of-three Super Regional will be $35 and will be available for purchase on ArkansasRazorbacks.com and at the Razorback Ticket Center at Baum Stadium. Single-game tickets will be $15, but will not be sold until gameday and only if seats remain. Due to NCAA ticket polices, we will be unable to provide complimentary tickets for University of Arkansas students. For more information on Arkansas baseball, follow @RazorbackBSB on Twitter.
Full throttle to the bottle. Richard Linklater’s goals for Everybody Wants Some!! were immensely ambitious. Not only was the film acting as somewhat of a pseudo-sequel in terms of both chronology and thematic elements to his critically acclaimed Boyhood (one of my favorite movies of all time), it was also acting as a spiritual successor to the beloved Dazed and Confused. Now, those are certainly enormous shoes to fill. So how does Linklater’s latest film focused on everyday life compare to his already impressive resume? Well, quite spectacularly. Everybody Wants Some!! focuses on college freshman Jake (Blake Jenner) and his first weekend spent in his new found college town. Jake is set to play for the college’s baseball team, and lives in a house with the rest of the team, comprised of hyper-competitive eccentrics. What follows is a weekend full of drinking, picking up girls, and discovering oneself. Yeah, on paper it sounds a little cliche, but it’s a relatable story, which is what Linklater excels at. All of his films are known for having a central humanist core to them, and Everybody Wants Some!! is no different. Everybody Wants Some!! subtly explores the aspects of self-identity of college students, how to define it, and what exactly that means in a time of tremendous change for most people. This subtext is threaded throughout the film and provides the majority of the emotional meat of this story. With that being said, it tackles this issue rather lightheartedly (along with almost everything else), and the film is all the better for it. In the hands of another director, this film could have been another cliche and generic college sex comedy, but Linklater injects genuine heart into this film and gives it palpable emotional depth. Instead of caricatures, Linklater is able to craft this group of rowdy college students into a group of characters that feel like real people (I’ll touch more on this later). Linklater’s specialty in film-making has always been making every day life engrossing, and Everybody Wants Some!! continues this trend. There is no real plot to the film, no real central conflict to focus on. It simply focuses on one weekend, and how this group of friends chooses how to spend it. It’s a real slice of life film, and it just various vignettes of the different activities the group indulges in. It’s a weekend full of drinking, ping pong, baseball, arcade games, lip syncing Rapper’s Delight, and picking up women. This lack of any real central plot helps give the film a breezy tone and it makes it easier to enjoy the interactions between Jake and the rest of his baseball team. The film is absolutely hilarious. Seriously, I must have had this stupid smile on my face for the entire film from how much I was laughing. It’s a simple film, but one that is such an enjoyable experience. It really focuses on living in the moment and because of this the film just feels exceedingly endearing. The entire cast does such a great job in the film. The chemistry between all of the actors in this film feels so real that it legitimately felt like I was watching a real group of friends hang out one weekend. They all had such an engaging dynamic. Coupled with a sharp and witty script, their interactions are easily the best part of the film. You get to see friendships and rivalries form naturally and it never feels forced. This competitive dynamic that exists between everyone feels so believable and leads to some moments of pure hilarity. Wyatt Russell and Glenn Powell are the standouts from the cast in my opinion, but everyone in the film did a fantastic job. Just like Dazed and Confused was a period piece set in the 1970s, and Boyhood was defined by the early 2000s, Everybody Wants Some!! lives and breathes 1980s culture. From the clothing, the activities, and the general outlook of the characters, everything in this film feels so authentically 80s which adds to the charm of this film. I don’t think you could separate this film from its time period, it’s integral to its tone and feel (I think Linklater is determined to make a defining film for every decade, but that’s merely my own speculation). This gives the film the excuse to have an amazing soundtrack, putting together the pretty much definitive 80s mixtape. The music itself is almost a character in the film, similar to the role music played in Guardians of the Galaxy. Once again it contributes to both the film’s authenticity and its easy going tone. It pairs well with the overall aesthetic of the film and I could see myself actually buying the soundtrack once it comes out (Rapper’s Delight is still stuck in my head..). Overall, I absolutely adored this movie. I’m a huge Linklater fan so I already had high hopes going into this film. When I read all of the glowing reviews that were coming out of SXSW, and my expectations skyrocketed even further. And even then Everybody Wants Some!! still managed to exceed my expectations. This film is just pure enjoyable fun. I think it’s safe to say that it is my favorite film of the year so far. It’s going to be hard to top this one. Linklater has done it again. 10/10 Advertisements Share this: Twitter Reddit Tumblr Facebook Google Like this: Like Loading...
Ralph Nader is best known for his work as a consumer advocate and for being a spoiler candidate in the 2000 presidential election. Now he’s urging Bernie Sanders to stay in the 2016 race, which is kind of hilarious. Telesur News reports: Ralph Nader Says Bernie Sanders Shouldn’t Drop Out of the Race Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate and former Green Party presidential candidate, encouraged Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders to stay in the race, in spite of several major losses over the past weeks. “But why should Bernie Sanders drop out? There could be a scandal with Hillary Clinton. Those transcripts and closed door meetings with the big bankers and other corporations could be released,” Nader told CNN in a telephone interview, highlighting the many lingering issues Clinton could face both in the primary season and in the general election. Clinton won four out of five contests last Tuesday, and New York before that. These victories have more or less closed Sanders’ road to the nomination, barring a major, unforeseen change. Nader pointed out that the superdelegates currently pledged to Clinton are able to change their minds. Nader ran as a third-party candidate in 2000, and many have accused him of splitting the Democratic vote, allowing former President George W. Bush to win. He dismisses these arguments. The irony of the situation isn’t lost on the Hillary campaign. Her press secretary was comparing Sanders to Nader a week ago on CNN: Politico also has a report on concerns over Bernie becoming another Nader: Clinton camp: Will Sanders turn into Ralph Nader? The Clinton campaign has a question for Bernie Sanders: Are you to become “a Ralph Nader and try to destroy the party?” Clinton’s chief strategist Joel Benenson accused Sanders of issuing attacks that hurt the Democratic Party in an interview with CNN’s “New Day” on Tuesday, the day of the New York primary. “The real challenge, is Senator Sanders going to stop attacks that hurt Democrats that we need up and down the ticket?” Benenson asked. “Is he going to try to support the party that is in favor of protecting voting rights, women’s rights, or turn himself into someone who will do what he said he wasn’t going do, and be a Ralph Nader and try to destroy the party when it comes to defeating Republicans in November?” Could Bernie run third party if he doesn’t get the Democratic nomination? Could we be so lucky? Featured image via YouTube.
“Bill Cassidy has repeatedly voted to slash seniors’ retirement benefits and turn Medicare into a voucher program that forces hundreds of thousands of Louisiana seniors to pay thousands more for their health care each year, and now he must own the new reckless G.O.P. budget proposal that does exactly that,” said Andrew Zucker, communications director for the Campaign for Louisiana, a Democratic group criticizing Mr. Cassidy, a House Republican running to unseat Senator Mary L. Landrieu. Representative Steve Israel of New York, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said that in the coming weeks, the committee would be buying online advertising in competitive House districts, making automated phone calls and creating a new website, “Scandalous,” to tell of district-specific cuts. “We are going to make this budget the centerpiece of the next seven months,” he said. Republican leaders had considered not doing a budget this year, since spending cuts for the current fiscal year and the next were set in December with passage of a bipartisan plan. But House conservatives demanded a document they could take to their strongly Republican districts. The new budget violates some tenets that both parties have tried to observe since the budget fights of 2011 and 2012. Those fights preserved a practice of cutting defense and nondefense programs almost equally while sparing the poorest Americans from the worst of the belt-tightening. Mr. Ryan’s plan does not strike that balance. In his plan, military spending through 2024 would actually rise by $483 billion over the spending caps established in the 2011 Budget Control Act “consistent with America’s military goals and strategies,” while nondefense spending at Congress’s annual discretion would be cut by $791 billion below those strict limits. In all, Mr. Ryan said, spending would be cut by $5.1 trillion over the next decade. More than $2 trillion of that would come from repealing Mr. Obama’s health care initiative, the Affordable Care Act, a political move that has become much more difficult with the closing of the first enrollment period. More than 10 million Americans have gotten health insurance through the law, either through private policies purchased on insurance exchanges, through expanded Medicaid or private policies purchased through brokers but subsidized by the law. As with past budget proposals, Mr. Ryan seeks to eliminate the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion, a $792 billion retrenchment, then turn the health care program for the poor into block grants to the states — saving an additional $732 billion over the decade. He would turn food stamps into a block grant program and cap spending, starting in 2020, cutting that program by $125 billion in five years. The budget relies on imposing new work requirements on food stamp and welfare recipients.
Did you know that penicillin can be grown outside of a lab? This mold-based antibiotic can be grown as a science project using a slice of bread. Please note that these instructions should be used for experimentation only; when there is a medical need for penicillin, it should be obtained through a doctor. Making penicillin does require some scientific equipment, and it is very important to keep the area sterile while you are growing penicillin. Here’s how to make penicillin: Supplies: Slice of bread or citrus peel 750ml Erlenmeyer flask Media (see Step 4) 1000ml (1 L) graduated cylinder Several clean milk bottles Prepare a penicillium culture. Expose a slice of bread or a citrus peel to a 70 degree Fahrenheit environment. A blue-green mold should develop. Sterilize the equipment. Place the flask in the oven at 315 degrees Fahrenheit for one hour, or sterilize in a pressure cooker for at least 15 minutes. Wash the milk bottles. Fill the Erlenmeyer flask. Cut the bread or citrus peel into small pieces and fill the flask. Allow to incubate in the dark at 70 degrees Fahrenheit for 5 days. After this incubation period, the flask can be stored in the refrigerator for no more than 10-14 days. Prepare the media. Dissolve the following ingredients, in the order listed, into 500ml of cold tap water: 44.0 grams Lactose Monohydrate, 25.0 grams cornstarch, 3.0 grams sodium nitrate, 0.25 grams magnesium sulfate, 0.50 grams potassium phosphate mono, 2.75 grams glucose monohydrate, 0.044 grams zinc sulfate, 0.044 grams manganese sulfate. Then add enough cold tap water to make one liter. Use hydrochloric acid to adjust the pH to between 5.0 and 5.5. Fill the bottles with media. Fill the milk bottles with this media. Use only enough so that when the bottle is placed in its side, the media does not reach the plug. Add the penicillin spores. First sterilize the bottles of media in a pressure cooker or in the stove, as you did the Erlenmeyer flask. When they have cooled, add approximately one tablespoon of the spores from the bread or citrus peel. Incubate the bottles. Allow the bottles to rest undisturbed on their sides at 70 degrees Fahrenheit for 7 days. If the culture has worked to produce penicillin, it will be in the liquid portion of the media following this incubation period. Finally, filter the media and refrigerate immediately. If you must use it, although this should be avoided, use as soon as possible. The penicillin made from this experiment should not be used unless it is a survival situation. It is possible for other, toxic molds to grow along with the penicillin, even if you know what you are doing. It is also possible for mold inhibitors to grow, stopping the growth of the penicillin spores.
President Donald Trump has only been in office for one full weekday, and Mayor Jim Kenney already has some choice words for him. They're in reference to one of two executive actions that Trump wasted no time signing – the first one withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation trade deal launched by the Obama administration. The second reinstated the "Mexico City" policy that was initially established by former President Ronald Reagan and limits federal funding to charities overseas that perform or promote abortions. In a statement issued Tuesday, Kenney suggested the newly elected commander in chief re-evaluate the latter decision. “While I concur with the President’s decision not to proceed with the TPP without a plan to support the middle-class jobs that would likely be lost as a result, I’m deeply disappointed in his decision to reinstate the Mexico City policy," he said in the statement. "It will hurt women’s healthcare across the globe, especially in communities where maternity mortality rates remain unconscionably high. I urge him to reconsider his decision.” As the leader of a Democratic city and advocate for LGBTQ rights, bettering police-community relations, schools and immigration, Kenney has greatly opposed Trump throughout his campaign. In an interview with Politico last week, Kenney questioned the president's Cabinet picks, including Ben Carson, who has been confirmed as the next secretary of Housing and Urban Development, as well as Jeff Sessions, who's being considered for U.S. attorney general. "I’d take George W. back in a minute," Kenney told the news organization.
Alberto Moreno: Sevilla claim move to Liverpool is off Sevilla sporting director Ramon Rodriguez Verdejo claims Liverpool's move for Alberto Moreno is off after the two clubs failed to agree a fee. Liverpool had made highly-rated left-back Moreno one of their top targets and made a bid for his services earlier this summer. However, they have been unable to agree a deal with Sevilla and Rodriguez Verdejo believes the 21-year-old will now stay at the club as it is unlikely the deal will be rekindled. “The matter of Alberto is practically settled. We couldn’t reach an agreement and I don’t think it can be revived,” Rodriguez Verdejo told El Correo de Andalucía. “It was a great offer, but the player is only 21 years old and it’s possible that the catharsis of being with the national team had a positive effect. The matter of Alberto is practically settled. We couldn’t reach an agreement and I don’t think it can be revived Ramon Rodriguez Verdejo “He has a lot of room to grow and the coach is very happy to have him. I don’t think we’ll make a lot of moves, but if on August 14 a club comes along and they give you a mountain of cash, well….I know you don’t like to hear it, but we are economic managers. “My feeling is that the negotiations are paralysed and I don’t see any hint that they will be restarted. We put a price on our players which we believe to be appropriate. Whoever wants to buy, can buy, and if you can’t… “Also, with the sale of (Ivan) Rakitic, our needs were covered. We don’t have the burden we had at other times.”
Who wants free coding help this Sunday? Per Harald Borgen Blocked Unblock Follow Following Jan 13, 2016 Learning to code involves a lot of moments like this one. Credit: Matylda Learning how to code online involves a lot frustrations. Complex setup, bugs and cryptic error messages are just a few of the battles you need to get through to learn a new language or technology. UPDATE: Click here to get to the YouTube page the Hangout will be broadcasted from. It’s especially tough when you’re all alone, because sometimes all you need is a fellow study mate to discuss your issues with. This has become especially clear to me after getting requests from people who has read my stories here on Medium, and are seeking my help. So I’d like to try out a little experiment: This Sunday, I’ll give free coding help to anyone interested. It’ll be done as a Google Hangout. Everybody who’s interested will be able to watch the Hangout, though I‘ll limit the amount of active participants to 3. This is because I want to dedicate at least 15–20 minutes to every active participant and his/her coding issues, plus spend a little bit of time answering questions from the signup form. This should total at around 1.5 hours, which is a suitable length for the session. If you’re interested in either watching or be an active participant, simply fill out this form and I’ll send you the Hangout link on Sunday. If you’re chosen to be an active participant, I’ll notify you quickly. The Hangout will start at eight a clock in the evening (8 p.m.) here in Norway, which corresponds to 7 p.m. in London, 2 p.m. in New York and 11 a.m in San Fransisco. Here is a Time&Date table. What kind of questions will I answer? You can ask me whatever you want, as long as it’s related to a subject I know something about (see next section). Here are a few examples: Can you review my project? Can you explain how controlled components work in React.js? Can you look at a bug I’m getting? How do I get my website to talk to an API? How do I go from amateur to professional developer as quick as possible? How do I get started with neural networks? No matter what request it is, I’ll try to help you as best as I can. I’m no oracle, so I might have to ask google for some help during the session, as google is a developers best friend. What kind of skills do I have? My main language is Javascript, as I work as a front end developer in Xeneta, where I build user interfaces in React.js. So this is where I’m able to give the best answers. I’ve also built a few projects using Node.js and the Hapi framework. Machine learning is one of my current hobbies, with Python as the language of choice. I mostly use the Scikit Learn package for creating models, but I‘ve also coded a couple neural networks, which you can read more about here. However, I’m far from a professional level in Python and machine learning, so my ability to answer will be limited. I’m also happy to help anybody who needs guidance in their path to become a developer. Read more about transition from non-technical to hired developer here: Feel free to look through (and follow) my GitHub to get a better idea over my skills: How to join To join in on the Hangout, all you have to do is fill out this form. If you’re interested in getting one-on-one help, you’ll need to tell me a little bit about you want help with. If you’re only interested in watching the session, simply fill in your email, and alternatively any questions you’d like me to answer in the first section of the Hangout. Hoping to see as many as possible there! Cheers, Per
With its ICO forthcoming in mid-july, crypto-based social trading platform CoinDash announced their third significant institutional investment with Fintech Blockchain Group (FBG) joining in. The company first received investments from Coinsiliium, a blockchain accelerator for startups and blockchain focused hedge fund HyperChain Capital. FBG is one of the largest crypto funds in China and officially became another one of CoinDash’s top tier investors this month. FBG is considered a crypto and blockchain investment powerhouse in China and has invested in projects such as iEx, Wings, Bancor, Status and others. In addition to the investment, Vincent Zhou of Fintech Blockchain Group has joined the CoinDash advisory board. Vincent is a founding partner of FinTech Blockchain Group and an expert on digital currency trading as well as an active investor in the blockchain industry. As an early adopter of blockchain technology, Vincent will advise CoinDash in all matters related to the Chinese community and local strategy. This month CoinDash plans to reveal more details about their approaching token sale, including specific dates when the sale is to take place, the amount planned to raise, and additional aspects of the sale. It was also noted that registration is now open for CoinDash’s automated bounty platform. Bounty participants will be able to enter their bounty ETH address to which they wish to receive rewards and apply to all the campaigns currently participating in and many others. Participants in the bounty program will be entitled to STARS which in turn will be converted into CDTs after the token sale is over.
Sewaholic’s Granville II Y I K E S ! How could I have possibly spent so much time sewing this shirt again? The answer lies in making it fit, but alas, it fits. Not quite ready to cut into the silk I planned to sew two garments ago, I bought a bolt of muslin and learned how to fit Sewaholic’s Granville Shirt to my body. My wearable muslin had several issues, namely tightness through the bust , misplaced darts and bunching in the back. Many readers suggested the fit was as good as RTW, which is precisely why I have avoided tailored shirts throughout my life. They look terrible on me. My mission was to make a fitted shirt, and it took two more muslins to get it right. Careful measuring resulted in a too tight bust again leading me to make my first full bust adjustment (FBA). Would you believe a 3/8 “ adjustment affected the fit of the entire shirt? I followed Sarah Verblen’s instructions from The Complete Guide to Perfect Fitting and the alteration took 10 minutes. \ In addition to cutting a smaller size I pinned out 1 1/2 inches of excess from the center back and side back pieces. Somewhere during the process I realized I do not fit the Sewaholic pear shape description, but there was no turning back…. plus, I wanted that nicely shaped back receiving rave reviews! I’m all over the place with this pattern but it works: Size 4 – neck, back, sleeves Size 2 – shoulders Size 6 – front Size 0 – hips The size 0 hips is due to the large flair in the pattern, not my slim hips 😉 After making all of the fitting adjustments I added 1 ½ “ of length back to the shirt. Taking the lead from my husband’s dress shirts I curved the cuffs to avoid turning four more points. The shirt is sewn from an old piece of linen in my stash and contrasted with a floral Amy Butler remnant and striped cotton from one of Hubs’ discarded shirts. Sewing a fitted button down shirt has been quite the process but something I wish I had addressed long ago, for avoidance accomplishes nothing. So ……… after ten days of shirt-making I have one shirt that fits, one good muslin, but infinite possibilities! Until soon 🙂
With the launch of the iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, for the very first time, Apple’s flagship smartphones now supports Qi wireless charging. Apple sells a couple of Qi chargers in its store, including Belkin’s Boost Up Wireless Charging Pad, and Mophie’s Wireless Charging Base, but we also purchased several cheaper Qi-certified chargers from Amazon to compare. Which wireless charger might be right for you? Watch our hands-on video walkthrough for more details. Synology RT2600ac: The AirPort Extreme replacement. How the test was performed In this test, I looked as several different factors, including build quality, color, cord length, power adapter, charging capability, and more. All of the chargers in this test are Qi-compliant, but each brings a slightly different form factor to the table. The most important part of this hands-on — the actual charging — was performed using the stock power plug that came with the charger (in the case of Belkin’s and Mophie’s offering) or by using Apple’s 12W USB Power Adapter, since none of the others shipped with a power plug. This test was performed using the same type of parameters that I used in our iPhone 8 fast charging test. After resting the iPhone 8 on the charger to top it off to the next power increment (e.g. 6% to 7%), I started the Clock app’s timer. Prior to doing so, Airplane mode was enabled, auto brightness disabled, and screen brightness set to 50%. Screen timeout was disabled as well in order to monitor the iPhone 8’s charging progress, and all apps were closed, except for the Clock app, which remained on screen. Using the Clock app’s timer, I let the iPhone 8 charge for 30 minutes. I then repeated this process for the four remaining Qi-enabled chargers in this test. The results, as you can see below, are largely similar for all of the Qi-enabled chargers. There are definite differences between each charger as far as form factor and fit and finish are concerned, but when it came to the actual process of “slow” charging the iPhone 8, the results were pretty much the same across the board. Note: all tests were performed using iOS 11.0.2. I also performed the test once using the Mophie Wireless Charging Base while running the iOS 11.1 beta, and the results were no faster. Video walkthrough Subscribe to 9to5Mac on YouTube for more videos The Qi wireless chargers tested Sold in Apple Store Features proprietary charging plug Comes with built in power brick Most robust build Sleekest overall design Price: $59.95 Amount charged in 30 minutes: 21% Output: 19V/1.3A Officially supports 7.5W fast charging upgrade Sold in Apple Store Features proprietary charging plug Comes with built in power brick Largest surface area White color looks great with Silver and Gold iPhone 8 Price: $59.95 Amount charged in 30 minutes: 20% Output: 15V/1.5A Officially supports 7.5W fast charging upgrade Available on Amazon Features short micro USB cable No power brick included Smallest surface area of all chargers Price at time of purchase: $19.99 Amount charged in 30 minutes: 21% Output: 5V/1A Available on Amazon \| Alternative Features lengthy, high quality micro USB cable No power brick included Unique square design Most lightweight charger Price at time of purchase: $24.99 Amount charged in 30 minutes: 20% Output: 9V/1.8A Available on Amazon \| Alternative Features short micro USB cable No power brick included Allows your iPhone to stand while charging Price at time of purchase: $19.95 Amount charged in 30 minutes: 18% Output: 9V/1.8A About “fast” wireless charging Apple notes on the product pages for both the Mophie and the Belkin charger that fast wireless charging will be enabled via a software update due later this year. As of now, actual charging speeds will be close to the same speeds garnered from the 5W Power Adapter included with the iPhone 8. Although the latest Qi specification (version 1.2) supports 15W wireless fast charging, the iPhone 8 and iPhone X will only support half of that. This appears to be either a software or hardware limitation, or a combination of both. Once the “fast charging” update is applied, charging wattage will increase by 50% up to 7.5W, which should provide a subtle, yet noticeable increase in charging speed. We will be sure to test the chargers again once the update goes live, but technically all of them, sans the Anker Wireless Charging Pad, supply enough output to support 7.5W fast charging. The issue, however, may have to do with secure encryption. We’ve heard through unofficial channels that only supported partners (in this case Belkin and Mophie) will support the faster 7.5W charging. Which iPhone 8 wireless charger should you buy? If you’re looking for a wireless charger that you know will garner official support from Apple, then the Mophie Wireless Charging Base and the Belkin Boost Up Wireless Charging Pad are your best bets. That said, both are super expensive, and don’t offer much more than an inexpensive Qi-enabled charger off Amazon does right now. There’s also next year’s release of Apple’s AirPower wireless charging accessory. AirPower will allow you to charge your iPhone, AirPods, and Apple Watch simultaneously on the same surface. Scheduled to land sometime in 2018, price details have yet to be revealed, but you can be sure that it will cost more than Belkin’s or Mophie’s third-party offerings. What about fast charging with USB-C? Wireless charging is convenient, but slow overall. However, I find that it’s a great way to top off your iPhone 8’s battery, or for charging it overnight. For those times when you need to charge quickly, for example, when you’re about to leave the house, a fast charger is a much better option. Last week, we published an article and video highlighting some of the best fast charging options for the iPhone 8 and iPhone X. A fast charger, which meets the USB Power Delivery (USB-PD) spec, offers significantly improved charging times when compared to a wireless charger. Watch our hands-on video below for more details: Conclusion As mentioned, the “safest” bet would be to purchase one of the chargers officially endorsed by Apple. However, if you’re looking for a multitude of chargers to place around your house, then going for one of the cheaper chargers seems like the right move instead of buying a bunch of $60 chargers from the Apple Store. There’s also form factor to take into consideration. If you’re looking for a charger that allows you to rest your iPhone at an ideal viewing angle, then a product like Otium’s Wireless Charging Stand Dock may be an ideal candidate. The bottom line is that wireless charging is going to be much slower than charging via a proper Lightning cable. It’s definitely not the speed, but it’s the convenience factor that makes it so appealing.
A young woman has died after having a second-trimester abortion at a Chicago-area Planned Parenthood clinic. Tonya Reaves, 24, died late Friday night, according to a local CBS television station, of hemorrhage, with a cervical dilation and evacuation, according to the medical examiner’s office following an autopsy after the abortion that claimed her life. CBS Chicago said Reaves died after the abortion she had at 18 S. Michigan Avenue Planned Parenthood facility. The woman was transported from the Loop Health Center Planned Parenthood abortion clinic to Northwestern Memorial Hospital where she was pronounced dead at 11:20 P.M. An autopsy conducted Saturday determined that she died from hemorrhage following a Dilation and Evacuation abortion. The D&E abortion method is one employed in pregnancies that have advanced beyond the first trimester. In involves opening the cervix and removing the pre-born baby by dismembering him or her. The Loop Health Center Planned Parenthood advertises abortions up to 18 weeks. Tonya’s twin sister Toni was devastated by the news, telling the television station, “We were born the same day. She was my other half.” “It happened so fast. She was just fine one day and then the next day she was gone. We’re just trying to figure out what happened… what happened,” she said. Reaves’ sister indicated Tonya was engaged to be married and had another son, who had just enjoyed his first birthday. Troy Newman, the head of Operation Rescue and Pro-Life Nation, told LifeNews he is saddened by Reaves unnecessary death. “Abortion deaths like this are completely avoidable. When a woman bleeds to death after an abortion, it is usually an indication of error on the part of the abortionist coupled with a delay in calling for emergency assistance. Planned Parenthood should be held accountable,” said Newman. “Our heartfelt prayers go out to the victim’s family at this time of tragic loss.” Newman said the abortion death follows a recent expose’ published in the Chicago Tribune in June, 2011, that took to task abortion facilities in the state failing to report abortion complications and exposed the fact that some abortion practitioners did not report complications at all, in violation of the law. At that time, Illinois officials made no attempt to enforce abortion laws in that state. Newman said that, while the name of the abortion practitioner in this case is likely unknown, Planned Parenthood’s most recent 990 Tax Forms list abortionist Caroline M. Hoke as its Medical Director. In fact, Planned Parenthood of Illinois CEO Carole Brite, in a written statement the television station obtained, refused to give further details, saying, “We do not publicly discuss private patient matters and we follow HIPAA laws that forbid the disclosure of patient information.” CLICK LIKE IF YOU’RE PRO-LIFE! Newman called on the Obama administration to pull taxpayer funding from the Planned Parenthood abortion business because of the death. “In light of this tragedy, which is yet another in a long list of Planned Parenthood abuses, we call on President Obama to immediately withdraw all Federal funding and personal support from Planned Parenthood,” said Newman. “Friday’s death is yet another reason why men and women of conscience across this nation cannot and will not comply with the forced funding of abortion and its intentional violation of religious liberties.”
Things have not been going well for the House Republicans’ Benghazi committee, which is overseeing an investigation that, as of last week, has now lasted over two years. This morning, things have managed to get worse for the GOP’s partisan witch hunt. As of a couple of weeks ago, the Defense Department started pushing back against the committee Republicans’ increasingly outlandish demands. In no uncertain terms, the Pentagon let Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) know the panel’s requests have become “unnecessary” and “unproductive.” Worse, the DoD believes the partisan committee is guilty of “encouraging speculation” from witnesses, rather than focusing on facts and evidence. Today, however, the beleaguered committee, whose very existence has become something of a joke, is facing a new round of embarrassing headlines. The Huffington Post reported : Huffington Post Shortly before the House Benghazi committee ramped up its battles with the Department of Defense in its probe of the 2012 terrorist attack, the committee’s own top lawyer admitted at least four times in interviews with military officials that there was no more they could have done on that tragic night. That’s according to a letter obtained by The Huffington Post that was sent Sunday to the chairman of the committee, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), from the top Democrats on the Benghazi panel and the House Armed Services Committee, Reps. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) and Adam Smith (D-Wash.). Remember, the whole point of the right-wing conspiracy theory is built around the idea that the military could’ve done more to intervene in Benghazi the night of the September 2012 attack, but it didn’t for political reasons. Military leaders, the State Department, and multiple congressional investigations all concluded that the conspiracy theory is wrong, but House Republicans don’t care, which is why they created a committee, led by Trey Gowdy, to tell conservatives what they want to hear. Now, however, there’s evidence that Gowdy’s former top committee staffer already concluded that the question has been answered truthfully. The Benghazi panel is investigating a conspiracy theory that the committee’s lawyer considers bogus. According to the letter, that staffer, former Gen. Dana Chipman, said in interviews with former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and former Defense Department Chief of Staff Jeremy Bash that the department did all it could on that night when Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans were killed. “I think you ordered exactly the right forces to move out and to head toward a position where they could reinforce what was occurring in Benghazi or in Tripoli or elsewhere in the region,” Chipman told Panetta in the committee’s January interview with the former defense secretary, according to transcribed excerpts. “And, sir, I don’t disagree with the actions you took, the recommendations you made, and the decisions you directed.” Chipman was similarly deferential to Bash. “I would posit that from my perspective, having looked at all the materials over the last 18 months, we could not have affected the response to what occurred by 5:15 in the morning on the 12th of September in Benghazi, Libya,” said Chipman, who himself served 33 years in the Army. And if the military did everything it could that night, the conspiracy theory is no more. The Benghazi committee is asking questions that have been answered to the satisfaction of the committee’s top lawyer, chosen by the committee’s Republican chairman.
Testing Netflix on Android Netflix Technology Blog Blocked Unblock Follow Following Mar 13, 2012 When Netflix decided to enter the Android ecosystem, we faced a daunting set of challenges: a) We wanted to release rapidly every 6–8 weeks, b) There were hundreds of Android devices of different shapes, versions, capacities and specifications which need to playback audio and video and c) We wanted to keep the team small and happy. Of course, the seasoned tester in you has to admit that these are the sort of problems you like to wake up to every day and solve. Doing it with a group of other software engineers who are passionate about quality is what made overcoming those challenges even more fun. Release rapidly You probably guessed that automation had to play a role in this solution. However automating scenarios on the phone or a tablet is complicated when the core functionality of your application is to play back videos natively but you are using an HTML5 interface which lives in the application’s web view. Verifying an app that uses an embedded web view to serve as its presentation platform was challenging in part due to the dearth of tools available. We considered, Selenium, AndroidNativeDriver and the Android Instrumentation Framework. Unfortunately, we could not use Selenium or the AndroidNativeDriver, because the bulk of our user interactions occur on the HTML5 front end. As a result, we decided to build a slightly modified solution. Our modified test framework heavily leverages a piece of our product code which bridges JavaScript and native code through a proxy interface. Though we were able to drive some behavior by sending commands through the bridge, we needed an automation hook in order to report state back to the automation framework. Since the HTML document doesn’t expose its title, we decided to use the title element as our hook. We rely on the onReceivedTitle notification as a way to communicate back to our Java code when some Javascript is executed in the HTML5 UI. Through this approach, we were able to execute a variety of tasks by injecting JavaScript into the web view, performing the appropriate DOM inspection task, and then reporting the result through the title property. With this solution in place, we are able to automate all our key scenarios such as login, browsing the movie catalog, searching and controlling movie playback. While we automate the testing of playback, the subjective analysis of quality is still left to the tester. Using automation we can catch buffering and other streaming issues by adding testability in our software, but at the end of the day we need a testers to verify issues such as seamless resolution switching or HD quality which are hard to achieve today using automation and also cost prohibitive. We have a continuous build integration system that allows us to run our automated smoke tests on each submit on a bank of devices. With the framework in place, we are able to quickly ascertain build stability across the vast array of makes and models that are part of the Android ecosystem. This quick and inexpensive feedback loop enables a very quick release cycle as the testing overhead in each release is low given the stakes. Device Diversity To put device diversity in context, we see almost around 1000 different devices streaming Netflix on Android every day. We had to figure out how to categorize these devices in buckets so that we can be reasonably sure that we are releasing something that will work properly on these devices. So the devices we choose to participate in our continuous integration system are based on the following criteria. We have at least one device for each playback pipeline architecture we support (The app uses several approaches for video playback on Android such as hardware decoder, software decoder, OMX-AL, iOMX). We choose devices with high and low end processors as well as devices with different memory capabilities. We have representatives that support each major operating system by make in addition to supporting custom ROMs (most notably CM7, CM9). We choose devices that are most heavily used by Netflix Subscribers. With this information, we have taken stock of all the devices we have in house and classified them based on their specs. We figured out the optimal combination of devices to give us maximum coverage. We are able to reduce our daily smoke automation devices to around 10 phones and 4 tablets and keep the rest for the longer release wide test cycles. This list gets updated periodically to adjust to the changing market conditions. Also note that this is only the phone list, we have a separate list for tablets. We have several other phones that we test using automation and a smaller set of high priority tests, the list above goes through the comprehensive suite of manual and automation testing. To put it other way, when it comes to watching Netflix, any device other than those ten devices can be classified with the high priority devices based on their configuration. This in turn helps us to quickly identify the class of problems associated with the given device. Small Happy Team We keep our team lean by focusing our full time employees on building solutions that scale and automation is a key part of this effort. When we do an international launch, we rely on crowd-sourcing test solutions like uTest to quickly verify network and latency performance. This provides us real world insurance that all of our backend systems are working as expected. These approaches give our team time to watch their favorite movies to ensure that we have the best mobile streaming video solution in the industry. In a future post, we will discuss our iOS test process which provides its own unique set of technical challenges. Amol Kher is the Engineering Manager in Tools for the Android, iOS and AppleTV teams. If you are interested in joining Netflix or the Mobile team, apply at www.netflix.com/jobs.
Illustration: Matt Golding. But the fact that the Napthine government has effectively deemed myki fixed after a 2011 review has not stopped others from attempting to change the ‘‘scope’’ of the system. Two tech-savvy entrepreneurs have just launched a small business renting myki passes to visitors, offering a service they consider to be badly needed and at the same time seeking to profit from the system’s biggest shortcoming. Iori Nishida and Samier Davis began their web-based business Mykihire this month, which involves posting myki passes in the mail to visitors to Melbourne. Cards loaded with credit are rented to tourists for anywhere between three days and three weeks, for less than the going cost of buying a card and paying fares. Customers are charged between $6.50 and $6.25 a day, depending on how long they hire the card for, plus $2 postage. Mykihire has so far had just 10 customers, Mr Nishida said, and a warning from Public Transport Victoria that the business might be breaking the law, although the authority has taken no action yet. ‘‘They’re [PTV] not particularly happy about the idea but I think this is something that helps other people because travellers are paying so much more than what they should be – the fact that the government got rid of the short-term tickets makes it so much harder for travellers,’’ Mr Nishida said. It has not been possible to buy a single-use ticket in Melbourne since the death of Metcard in December 2012. The Napthine government scrapped single-use myki tickets in 2011 on the advice of a review by professional services firm Deloitte, which it has refused to make public. The government claims the decision will save $30 million a year. Meanwhile, $15.7 million worth of single-use myki tickets have been destroyed. The decision has been criticised for penalising irregular users of the system. Both the Victorian Tourism Industry Council and the Public Transport Users Association say the lack of short-term tickets simultaneously discourages people from using public transport and encourages inadvertent fare evasion. The need to buy a card before travelling is also an unreasonable financial burden on visitors, says Tony Morton, the Public Transport Users Association’s president. ‘‘Some of the biggest frustrations we see are people visiting from the country with their family, say a family of four, and they have to spend close to $20 on myki cards before they can start paying for fares,’’ Dr Morton said. Victorian Tourism Industry Council chief executive Dianne Smith said myki was still not as widely accessible as it should be. She said the myki visitor pack released in 2012 as a salve for put-out tourists – a $14 pack that includes a myki card, $8 of myki money and discount offers to 15 attractions – had so far been only a ‘‘moderate’’ success. The council has calculated that 2.5 million to 3 million visitors to Melbourne last year might have used public transport, while 183,000 myki visitor packs were sold in 2013, meaning between 6 and 7 per cent bought one. ‘‘Out of 3 million visitors potentially, 183,000 is a modest percentage,’’ Ms Smith said. ‘‘This is why I go back to the Skybus idea: we need to make sure that at every possible intersection for a tourist or visitor it’s really clear that yes, you can get it and it’s easy to use.’’ Integrating myki with the Skybus service to Melbourne Airport is one of two key proposals the council has submitted to government on how to improve myki: the other is making the cost of unused travel redeemable. This can be done, but involves submitting a refund form to Public Transport Victoria and returning unwanted myki cards in the mail. Among other lingering myki flaws, the slow response times of myki readers - which leads to long queues at railway stations and delays in the peak hours – is finally being improved, although it may take years for most public transport users to benefit. Fairfax Media has learned that new, faster gates will be installed at the freshly rebuilt Springvale and Mitcham railway stations next month, with busy Richmond station soon to follow. The new gates, which have eye-catching red paddles, will no longer display fare change or account balance information, only registering whether or not a passenger has successfully touched off. The new gates can clear 55 people per minute, Public Transport Victoria says, a 20 per cent improvement on the current rate of 45 people per minute. ‘‘These next generation myki gates will be installed progressively across the public transport network as new stations are built or existing stations are upgraded,’’ it says. Myki never reached its contractually agreed touch-on speeds, but NTT Data will not contribute to the cost of installing the new, speedier gates. The company, which reported a dramatic profit turnaround to corporate regulator ASIC in 2012 following a ‘‘major contractual change’’ to its agreement with the state government, could have a limited future as myki’s operator. The government will put myki out to tender in 2016, and plans to award the next contract to ‘‘a ticketing operator with a demonstrated track record operating major smart ticketing systems, meeting operational requirements and delivering maximum value for Victorian taxpayers’’. Given no further modifications are likely, other companies are likely to be interested in competing to operate the system. In 2012, Kamco chief executive Greg Purdy criticised the original contract awarded in 2005 at a parliamentary hearing, stating that it was signed before the Labor government knew what it required. ‘‘Given the system complexity that was being undertaken at the time, it would have been better served by both parties - both by the contractor and the government at the time - to have invested more heavily in the beginning to flesh out the requirements before the system had started to be developed,’’ Mr Purdy said. The changing requirements that followed saw the 10-year contract blow out by half a billion dollars, from $994 million to $1.55 billion, a price tag too high even for its harshest critics to contemplate replacing the system two years hence. ‘‘The time to scrap myki was really back in 2010 when there was political momentum to stop throwing good money after bad and ... that hasn’t happened, so we’re stuck with this system now,’’ Dr Morton said.
In an exclusive interview with CNN’s Candy Crowley last Sunday, President Obama addressed critics who believed he was too soft on Russia and that he was allowing Russian president Vladimir Putin to “roll America.” According to Obama: There was a spate of stories about how he is the chess master and outmaneuvering the West and outmaneuvering Mr. Obama and this and that and the other. And right now, he's presiding over the collapse of his currency, a major financial crisis and a huge economic contraction. That doesn't sound like somebody who has rolled me or the United States of America. The ruble has fallen sharply in the past few weeks and there are current stories coming out of Russia about potential bank runs. Last week the ruble became the world’s worst performing currency. This week, however, the Russian currency does appear to be stabilizing-- it's back up by 30%. So have sanctions and falling oil prices sunk Russia? Get the Latest Market Data and News with the Yahoo Finance App Not really says Marin Katusa, author of “The Colder War,” and chief energy investment strategist at Casey Research. Katusa believes that falling oil prices will eventually give Russia the upper hand and deeply injure the U.S. energy industry. The falling ruble makes Russian oil less expensive and more desirable to other countries—Russia also produces oil quite cheaply while the American shale industry has a larger cost of operation. Russia is more than able to weather the current storm, Katusa says. “They have a $200 billion a year trade surplus. They have over $400 billion in reserve currency. They’ve increased their gold reserve. They have much lower debt to their GDP than America. So yes there’s pain in the economy… [but] it's far from terminal.” On Tuesday the Ukrainian Parliament voted to drop its “non-aligned” status and begin work towards a NATO membership. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said this “unproductive” move would only increase tension between Russia and Ukraine. Katusa believes that this is the beginning of another cold war. “The Ukraine parliament only did this after Obama guaranteed hundreds of billions of dollars in military support to fight the Russians,” he says. “And what is critical here is we all know that the logarithmic rule in war when you commit hundreds of millions - it means billions of dollars and through these actions Obama has declared the colder war on Russia.” Katusa believes that this move will result in more atrocities on both sides of the border, but mostly in Ukraine. According to Katusa, sanctions have only made it so that Russia must work more closely with emerging markets like China. “We’ve seen billions of dollars of increase in the currency swaps between China and Russia and it’s going to continue,” he says. Currently about 9% of China’s oil exports come from Russia but Katusa predicts that number will grow significantly in the decades to come. More from Yahoo Finance Can Twitter be sued for your tweets? The Facebook for the home improvement community: Porch Holiday retailer wrap-up
Her husband, David Barber, 67, worked at the plant for 21 years, coating fabrics in the Teflon material. He recalled seeing small specks of the material get stuck on the ends of co-workers’ cigarettes and turn to ash as the smokers inhaled that, too. Within a couple of hours, they would get chills and sweats, as if they were coming down with the flu. “We were kind of young and foolish,” Mr. Barber said. “We never really talked about it; we never really thought too much about it. It paid good, and they treated us fairly well.” An analysis earlier this month by the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit organization that has urged the E.P.A. to lower the level at which it says water with PFOA is safe to drink, found that the chemical had been detected in 103 water systems, serving nearly seven million people in 27 states. (That does not include smaller water systems like those of Hoosick Falls or Petersburgh, which were not covered under the agency’s testing program.) The E.P.A. does not have a formal regulatory standard for the chemical, relying instead on a provisional health advisory level for drinking water, which it has announced it will update this spring. Some states lack even that. Trying to beat back criticism that New York State’s response in Hoosick Falls was, at best, blinkered — the state repeatedly said its water was safe last year before declaring it a Superfund site in January — New York officials have suggested that the fault lay with the absence of strong guidelines from the federal agency. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo again called on the E.P.A. to release a long-term advisory level for the chemical on Sunday, when he visited Hoosick Falls for the first time after its water was deemed unsafe.
4 minutes I’ve been part of a team recruiting for Scrum Masters …well, pretty much since I joined NewVoiceMedia. Now, for the first time since I joined we are about to be fully staffed (woohoo!). This got me thinking about what advice I would give to new Scrum Masters when they join a new company, or just a new team. I find it quite difficult joining a new team. Often, they are already formed and have their own way of doing things that they believe is good. It might be, for all I know, and that’s my problem. Given that my job is pretty much to ease their pain and help them become better than ever before, the first few weeks with a new team are excruciating for me. I want to help. I want to be valuable. I can often see things that look sub-optimal from the outset, and ‘fixing’ this is what they are paying me for after all, isn’t it? NO, NO, NO! I have to remind myself that it’s a long game! Take Time One of the absolute best pieces of advice I can give a Scrum Master who finds themselves in this position is this: Sit on your hands. Seriously. Do nothing but observe for at least an entire iteration – more if you can. Rushing to fix things risks missing context, and you could so easily make things worse. I have also found that delaying getting involved early increases the respect and trust I get from the team members further down the line. So, take a bit of time. Doing even the right thing, at the wrong time, makes it the wrong thing. If you watch and observe for the first few weeks, your next problem with a new team is knowing that you’ve improved things when you do start to help them. For the first few months with a new team I focus heavily on the following things. Take Notes I have mentioned before how much I value journalling, and this is another opportunity. Take notes on everything you see, and feel free to be judgemental if you like. I know, you won’t often hear me advocating that, but no one else is going to read it. Here’s why it might be helpful: It can help to capture your observations and impressions using more stark language than normal. Later, when you re-read your very partisan notes, it challenges your thinking. Your brain will try to validate the statements you wrote (after all, your brain will reason, you must have thought that because you wrote it). Also, because time has passed and you now feel part of the team, your brain will naturally leap to the ‘defence’ of your team. You will want to explore the opposite point of view to what you wrote. Right now though, its all about capturing observational data. You are likely to be completely wrong on at least 50% of your early observations anyway, so embrace that too. OK, so we are going to observe and record at first, but then what? How do I, as a new Scrum Master for my team, measure that we are improving? Take Measurements Firstly, accept that you can’t be accurate here, its just too subjective, so instead we want to look at trends. I want to measure that my team is adopting agile practices, and that they are continually improving. As we focus on how we do things, it can take us slightly longer to do them. Velocity and cycle time are 2 of my favourite core metrics for an agile team and are useful in the long term view, but may initially look worse. This is normal as we work to improve how we do things. So what else can we look at instead? Set a Benchmark As part of my journalling, I observe and frequently capture instances where I see evidence of great agile behaviour. This allows me to set a benchmark, and with snapshots taken periodically over time, I can infer trends in improvement. When ever I join a new team, I take this list with me as a starting point. I always ditch some of the questions, and add new ones too – even during the process. After all; every team is different, and has its own personal challenges. Here is the initial list I start with: This really is a tiny subset of the things that you might want to measure, and I like to focus at this stage on things that are good in the team. You could also look for signs of waste, good or poor communication, problems in live, problems with deployment. Its about finding a foothold to start with a new team, or in a new company, not measuring all the things! 2 Important Things: I never, ever, EVER publish them, or share them. No good can come of that, believe me! Don’t tell your team. Controversial, I know, but this isn’t about hiding things from them, its about making a fair assessment. If people think they are being watched, they alter their behaviour – it’s just human nature. Human beings can’t help gaming the system, if there is a path of least resistance, human beings will take it. As their scrum master, you will shortly be having great conversations with your team around good agile practices. Giving them compelling reasons to take a more difficult path is kinda your thing here. Take A Moment Often, a team will do something on your sample day but not on your next sample day. This can be frustrating and its VERY tempting to say “well I saw them do that yesterday, so I’ll mark it as observed today”. Try to stick to only observations made during the sample day in question and not game it. After all, this one census is of no worth on its own anyway, only as part of the whole collection over time. I always equate metrics to pixels in a picture: of little worth on their own, but together make up a reasonable picture of reality. I would suggest weekly snapshots are too often from my experience, but hey, whatever works for you. I snapshot fairly regularly at first – perhaps every 2 weeks for an initial 2 or 3 months. After this, the time between snapshots gets longer and longer, rather than regularly spaced. Take Your Place Inevitably I stop snapshot taking altogether once I feel fully aware of their world view. Its not a conscious decision, I just look back one day and find I’ve not recorded for a while. It always makes me feel good when I do this – it was an imperfect system that I have outgrown. I am at one with my team 🙂 Now its a great time to look back at your journals. Try not to cringe as you reflect on your initial thoughts! Where might you want to double down your efforts or change tactics with certain practices? Perhaps you need to arrange a workshop or further training for example. Is story break down a problem, or communication between developers and test? You have a whole heap of information at your fingertips – just work out what one thing is most important to address first. What do you do as a new scrum master when joining a team? I’d love to know. Helen.
WWE fucked up at the Royal Rumble. They gave the win to Roman Reigns and he wasn’t ready for it. People will blame his promo skills and his wrestling skills and his lack of experience as a singles performer for the outraged reaction his win generated. But none of these are the real reason that people were booing. You don’t have to look too hard to realize that much crappier wrestlers have been in the Wrestlemania main event: King Kong Bundy, a past his prime Andre, Ultimate Warrior, Lawrence Taylor, arguably Diesel and Sid, Batista. Crappier talkers have been in the Wrestlemania main event too: Andre, Sid, Batista, etc. There have been guys like Yokozuna who didn’t even really talk at all. No, the real areas where Reigns wasn’t ready were not related to his talent. His character wasn’t ready and he wasn’t popular enough yet. The reason that Reigns wasn’t popular enough by the Rumble is because there was no reason that he should be. He wasn’t doing anything. There was nothing particular about his story or character that would appeal to the masses. The company was just saying “look at this guy! He’s pretty cool, you should like him.” And people did, because he seemed like a good prospect and he had an awesome look. But that wasn’t enough for him to be worthy of the main event. So when he was pushed to the main event before delivering on his potential, people got pissed. The other problem was Bryan. WWE had a genuinely popular returning wrestler in the Royal Rumble, with a reputation for being shafted by the company. So of course, they shafted Bryan yet again to try and get Reigns more over. Because Vince McMahon has a fucking doctorate in being clueless. If Reigns had been more popular by the time the Rumble rolled around, they could have just been the final two and when Reigns won the fans would have accepted it. But WWE made things difficult for themselves. Now they have to try and make Reigns popular after the fact, now that fans are predisposed to disliking him. And they have to try and appease Bryan’s angry fans. These are separate issues. There is no sweeping gesture they can make that solves both problems. A triple threat is a bad idea. Shuffling matches around only makes the company look confused and desperate. They should be focusing on two separate things: 1) Get Reigns over 2) Get Bryan’s fans to shut the fuck up whining Solving the first problem is the harder one. But the important thing in order to achieve this is to let Reigns do things. Fans can jeer him as a main event talent if he’s just showing up and going through the motions, but wrestling fans cheer for big spots and big moments and unusual occurrences. Reigns has been just sitting and waiting for the title over the last year. Lets now make him work for it. The first thing to do is get Reigns thrown out of the building. Have him absolutely destroy someone from the Authority. Make it Big Show to put an end to that mess. He kills Big Show, writing him off television (or he can show up in a wheelchair or some shit). It has to be a brutal attack to justify keeping him off Raw. Triple H can say he’s been suspended for being a danger to others, but they can’t strip him of his title shot. Now Reigns becomes the invader. Hopping the rail to lay the fucking hurt on some bitches only to run off again. Maybe security tries to grab him on one occasion, but he ends up battering a dozen guys. Have him throw people off the stage, attack people in the locker room and generally create chaos. Big spots get a big response from the fans. They won’t be able to boo this stuff. Gradually he’ll get more and more popular. If you can make fans believe that whenever a star appears, something exciting will happen, that star will get over in a huge hurry. That was a massive part of Stone Cold’s appeal. Reigns doesn’t have to talk much here either, which is a good thing. But when he does talk it should be shoot promos. Just grabbing a live mic and chewing people out before his mic cuts. The smarks who love Bryan also love a good shoot promo. If he’s talking about something that’s (vaguely) real he’ll speak more naturally and he can use these promos to put the heat for Bryan’s treatment back where it belongs: on the Authority. A couple of big brawls between Reigns and Lesnar along with the vaguest of insinuations that Lesnar might have finally met his match and fans would be salivating for this main event. The second problem is the easier one: to shut Bryan’s fans up just give him something big to do. He should be in the second highest match on the Wrestlemania card. With Reigns “officially” off Raw, Bryan can be the guy booked in Raw main events and there should be plenty of time to let him shine and build a great angle for him. All they need to do is make sure people are excited about Bryan’s match. If you’re just using people from the roster, a massive grudge match between Bryan and Rollins would have everybody creaming their pants in anticipation. Even the ladies. Especially the ladies! Arguably the two most over performers on the roster right now, who could leave it all out there and have a five star match at Wrestlemania. If I was promised this match tomorrow, I wouldn’t care if Reigns was main-eventing against Papa Shango and Barney the freaking Dinosaur. Something else they could explore is Bryan fighting a returning star. Any massive star would do, but I’ll give an example: If Rock has more free time available, Bryan vs the Rock would shut up all those who think the company doesn’t consider Bryan a star. People have suggested Reigns turning heel on Rock, but what if Rock turned heel instead? Not on Reigns, but on Bryan. Reigns would be banned from the building, appearing only in short and violent spurts. But when Bryan complains about not being in the main event, Rock can come out and say Bryan doesn’t deserve to be the main event. That he came back to endorse Reigns because he actually looks like a star, and the WWE is a laughing stock with trolls like Bryan in the main event. Reigns looks Hollywood. He looks main stream. He could be somebody. Have Rock play the 2003 Hollywood Heel Rock character. Reigns wouldn’t endorse what Rock was saying of course, but by the time he actually manages to say that on television, Rock has already built up a nice feud with Bryan that would bring a bunch of attention to the company and would keep all Bryan’s fans happy. I’m 100% sure that this kind of scenario would keep Reigns face and satisfy Bryan’s fans without taking anything away from Wrestlemania. But of course, WWE will just flounder around and ultimately make the situation worse. That’s kinda their thing.
Sorry, Terra, but he’s just not that into you. Well, we all have our disappointments in life. For example, I’m deeply disappointed in David Remnick’s hairpiece. Do I think that this will go down in history as a terrible toupee? I do. He doesn’t. I do. Obama’s sad little minions are now touting his sociopathy as a benefit. It’s our fault that Barry is so very uncomfortable with reality. We’re to blame for his inability to see the world as it is, not as he’d like it to be. That one is on us. Nothing is ever his fault. How could it be, you racist hillbilly teabaggers? Note to future historians: I did not vote for the idiot who was president between 2009 and 2017, and I’ve criticized him and his lack-brained adherents at every turn. Please leave me out of it. (Hat tip: Daniel Halper)
Health Insurance, Labor Supply, and Job Mobility: A Critical Review of the Literature NBER Working Paper No. 8817 Issued in February 2002 NBER Program(s):Aging, Health Care, Labor Studies, Public Economics This paper provides a critical review of the empirical literature on the relationship between health insurance, labor supply, and job mobility. We review over 50 papers on this topic, almost exclusively written in the last 10 years. We reach five conclusions. First, there is clear and unambiguous evidence that health insurance is a central determinant of retirement decisions. Second, there is fairly clear evidence that health insurance is not a major determinant of the labor supply and welfare exit decisions of low income mothers. Third, there is fairly compelling evidence that health insurance is an important factor in the labor supply decisions of secondary earners. Fourth, while there is some division in the literature, the most convincing evidence suggests that health insurance plays an important role in job mobility decisions. Finally, there is virtually no evidence in the literature on the welfare implications of these results. We present some rudimentary calculations which suggest that the welfare costs of job lock are likely to be modest. Our general conclusion is that health insurance has important effects on both labor force participation and job choice, but that it is not clear whether or not these effects results in large losses of either welfare or efficiency. The NBER Bulletin on Aging and Health provides summaries of publications like this. You can sign up to receive the NBER Bulletin on Aging and Health by email. Machine-readable bibliographic record - MARC, RIS, BibTeX Document Object Identifier (DOI): 10.3386/w8817 Published: McLaughlin, Catherine (ed.) Health Policy and the Uninsured. Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute Press, 2004. Users who downloaded this paper also downloaded* these:
There is No T in Lesbian In a recent anti-radical feminist screed, published prominently on several leftist blogs, a trans* activist attempted to equate gender critical analysis with homophobia. This is the latest twist on the conflation of the lesbian and gay rights political movement with the trans* political movement. And it’s the latest indication that it will be lesbians, other women, and girls who are most harmed by that conflation. Though there are claims that our groups have reason to have a strong political alliance, it’s arguable that Gay, Inc. – the large, well-funded and influential political groups – created this conflation simply to increase funding and reach. There doesn’t seem to have been a period of time where lesbians and gay men were allowed any discussion or input about this decision. But there are obvious reasons to question the unholy alliance. The true similarity between our groups is in the bedrock homophobia and misogyny of those who work against us. But here is the terrible irony of that: Trans, Inc. does not want to acknowledge that reality, let alone work on dismantling it, because it undermines their talking points. Look at how their narrative is broken by the reality of lesbian and gay experiences. A significant number of transmen are lesbians who report that they want to transition in an attempt to escape misogyny – their own internalized version as much as society’s. A significant percentage of transwomen are homosexual males, pressured into transitioning by conservative society that hates gender non-conforming gay men. And the majority of kids diagnosed with “gender dysphoria” will be or already are lesbian, gay, or bisexual. Beyond these realities – that trans* activists refuse to acknowledge – lesbian and gay people have almost no connection with trans* people or their issues. Yet the trans* political movement has ridden the coattails of the lesbian/gay political movement. We opened the doors, they walk through them. We set the stage, they take it over and turn the discussion to themselves. They had no original movement of their own, but have bent our arguments to their own purposes. And worse still, our resources are going toward meeting their needs. It’s long past time to look at what separates us and what has happened because of the mash-up of LGB-with-T. Chart — What separates the T from the L and G [click on the image above to open/download the chart] It is clear from looking at that chart that we have far less in common than is assumed. But despite the obvious differences in our experiences and interests, on the very rare occasions when this has been pointed out, all hell has broken loose. John Aravosis, a prominent gay blogger, wrote about this issue in 2007. This caused huge controversy and resulted in a public shaming of him for even daring to mention the false equivalency between lesbian/gay and trans* people. When Ronald Gold wrote the blog post, “‘No’ to the notion of transgender” for the popular gay website Bilerico, a similar thing happened. But you’ll have to read his post and the account of what happened to him on a different web site, because the original and all discussion thereof has been removed: Since then the issue has become untouchable and you won’t find any mention of it in the lesbian/gay media or major online communities. Instead there is very nearly lockstep enforcement of silence on the issue. The political alliances forced by the major political groups have created a de facto link in peoples’ minds between lesbian/gay political concerns and those of trans* people. So straight liberals have taken up the LGBT banner and with terrible irony, have bashed lesbians and gay men with it. Liberal online and print publications have been refusing to let us give our views when we disagree with trans* activist orthodoxy. The comments from the many gay and lesbian people who supported Aravosis are wiped off the post, but not the link to the rebuttal by the trans* activist transwoman and HRC Board of Governors member Dana Beyer. The bottom line for women in all of this is that, of all the people that Gay/Trans, Inc. claims to speak for, lesbians are most hurt by the false alliance. Employment discrimination against lesbians As described by Margaret Ryniker in her article, “Lesbians still face job discrimination,” lesbians are in the unique position of facing sexual harassment as women and, at the same time, discrimination because of their sexual orientation. Lesbians also represent a larger percentage of female workers in male-dominated fields, making them even more vulnerable to workplace harassment and discrimination. And in the U.S., a woman can be fired in over half the states just for being a lesbian. Yet the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which would provide protection for lesbians from being fired just for being lesbian, has still not been passed by Congress. There was a window of time when it might have been passed, but trans* activists very effectively derailed that opportunity to fight for their own rights instead of the rest of their coalition’s rights. Outrageously, most of their socio-political resistance has focused on the inclusion of language allowing males to use female bathrooms on the basis of gender identity. (Also note at that link the hateful language used toward a gay member of Congress.) In 2007, when Congressman Barney Frank was trying to get ENDA passed, even the Washington Post had some advice: “Delaying passage of ENDA, which was first introduced in the House in the mid-1970s by Rep. Bella Abzug (D-N.Y.), until the transgender community changes enough hearts and minds would be a mistake.” They may have said this because Frank was getting no help from Gay, Inc. In fact, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force was far more interested in trans* inclusion than in fighting for the named constituents of their organization. Large political/legal groups don’t focus on lesbians’ issues and concerns In addition to their fight against the better judgement of members of Congress, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force has been known to create their annual conference program without any mention of issues and interests specific to lesbians. The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) is equally focused on transgender issues. For example, HRC has provided a $10,000 grant to a legal clinic focused solely on trans* name change issues. The Astrea Lesbian Foundation for Justice is now a major supporter of trans* political organizations. A quick perusal of their philanthropy shows a $100 donation to the Lesbian Herstory Archives (one of the very rare organizations that still focus entirely on lesbians) and 10s of 1000s of dollars of donations to trans* oriented organizations. The National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) is now at least as focused on trans* issues as lesbian. From their website: “we are a national leader in shaping transgender law, and our Legal Director, Shannon Minter, is recognized as a leading architect and visionary of the transgender rights movement.” The legal director they are so proud of is a transman and NCLR states that 85% of their budget is spent directly on their legal programs. In the “Issues & Cases” portion of their website, the NCLR lists the following: Elder Law, Employment, Families and Parenting, Federal Legislation, Healthcare, Immigration, Marriage other Civil Rights, Relationship Recognition, Transgender Law, Sports, and Youth. That list is alphabetical, not hierarchical. What is most important couldn’t be more clear from reading closely. For each and every one of the other issues they address, “LGBT” is the community for whom they say they are working. There is only one constituent part of that coalition that is called out specifically and it isn’t “Lesbian,” it’s “Transgender.” The point is not to hate on Minter personally. The point is to see that Minter is taking care of a very specific community whose activism often works in ways that are not good for lesbians but probably always work in Minter’s favor. This diversion of our resources is happening despite the fact that lesbians and bisexual women make up somewhere in the range of 2-3% of the human population, while the entire trans* umbrella (which includes males who cross-dress for sexual gratification and transmen who want nothing to do with lesbians, their issues and causes) covers no more than .5% of the population, contrary to the inflated claims of Trans, Inc. It’s not hard to imagine that lesbians are major contributors to organizations with “lesbian” in their names and fully expect that their money is going to lesbians, their issues and needs. When lesbians donate to organizations that purport to serve lesbian interests, one wonders if they realize what percentage of resources are being diverted to the trans* cause. At what point does it become misrepresentation? And we have to ask ourselves why and with what input from the entire lesbian community has this focus become predominant. Women-only spaces are under assault The trans* political movement is deeply committed to ensuring that any male -– no matter his intent – is allowed into female-only spaces as long as he claims a trans-related gender identity. From bathrooms, to locker rooms, to dorm rooms, girls and women are being told they should not be able to refuse transwomen entrance. Beyond those spaces, what this means is that traditional enclaves of lesbians such as women’s music festivals and other cultural events, women-only political gatherings, and even athletic teams, are expected to be open to males who claim to “feel” like women. Pressure on lesbians from the trans* community to accept transwomen as women The event “Overcoming the Cotton Ceiling: Breaking Down Sexual Barriers for Queer Trans Women,” was held specifically to discuss how lesbians could be coerced to date and have sex with transwomen. In that vein, transwomen are creating accounts on lesbian dating sites without revealing their trans* status. And there is significant support online for the idea that transwomen should never have to reveal their trans* status when seeking to date lesbians online or in person. Young lesbians and would-be lesbians being pressured toward transgenderism In some communities there is significant social pressure on butch lesbians to identify as transmen. And the majority of gender non-conforming young girls and women become lesbians as adults. Yet trans* activists are now making substantial inroads into having such gender non-conforming girls declared “transgendered” and to enforce this designation, parents are strongly encouraged to put their daughters on puberty blockers before they have any idea who they really are. What now? Given all this, there seems little rational basis for lesbians to continue contributing their political efforts, resources, time, and energy to the combined Gay/Trans* movement. We especially do not want our work conflated with some of the current goals of trans* activism, including the support for the idea of “transgender” children who are born in the “wrong” body and to the idea that girls and women should not to be allowed female-only resources, opportunities, and spaces. Let’s start with some deep skepticism when we see the claims that trans* rights equal lesbian rights. Then we can move on to the complete awareness that our needs and interests are not (and are not going to be) served by being allies with people whose interests are so different (and in some cases counter) to our own. Our allies are in the radical feminist movement and elsewhere. Let’s raise our awareness and raise our voices. Things need to change. Note: Though Noanodyne is the author of this post, I developed it with the input of Gender Slayer, who came up with the initial idea for the chart, and with help from Elizabeth Hungerford, who contributed significant research for the reference sourcing as well as reviewing and refining support. I’m grateful for the collaboration. Advertisements
Critics of NSA spying in the Senate mounted an aggressive rebuttal Tuesday of Republicans who are pushing for a “clean” reauthorization of powers under the Patriot Act. In a series of speeches, Sens. Mike Lee Michael (Mike) Shumway LeePush to end U.S. support for Saudi war hits Senate setback The Hill's Morning Report — Emergency declaration to test GOP loyalty to Trump The Hill's 12:30 Report: Trump escalates fight with NY Times MORE (R-Utah), Steve Daines (R-Mont.), Dean Heller Dean Arthur HellerTrump suggests Heller lost reelection bid because he was 'hostile' during 2016 presidential campaign Trump picks ex-oil lobbyist David Bernhardt for Interior secretary Oregon Dem top recipient of 2018 marijuana industry money, study finds MORE (R-Nev.) Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and Patrick Leahy Patrick Joseph LeahySenate plots to avoid fall shutdown brawl Booker wins 2020 endorsement of every New Jersey Democrat in Congress The Hill's Morning Report - Can Bernie recapture 2016 magic? MORE (D-Vt.) all made the case for curbing the NSA's bulk collection of phone data, arguing the program is a threat to people’s rights. ADVERTISEMENT "We know that for years the NSA collected metadata about billions of emails sent by innocent Americans using the same justification," Leahy said. "Should we allow the government to sweep up all of our credit card records? All of our banking or medical records?... Enough is enough."The five senators support the USA Freedom Act, which is coming up for a vote in the House this week. The bill would end the NSA’s bulk collection of information about calls made in the U.S. and require the agency to obtain the data from private companies using a "specific selection term."Lee said that even assuming the NSA isn’t abusing its surveillance powers now, there's no guarantee agency officials won't step out of bounds in the future."Who's to say that the NSA will always be inhabited by such people? Who's to say what the state of affairs will be a year from now?" he said. "We know in time that people tend to abuse these government programs. ... It's not a question of if things like this will be abused, it's a question of when."Leahy added that he does not "accept that they will be very careful to make sure nothing happens to the secret data."Senate Majority Leader(R-Ky.) has rejected the USA Freedom Act and is instead pushing the "clean" legislation, which would reauthorize the expiring portions of the Patriot Act for five years without changes.McConnell and Republican Sens.(N.C.),(Fla.) and(Ark.), defended the NSA surveillance in floor speeches last week, arguing the program is necessary to help protect America from another terrorist attack.Heller on Tuesday said supporters of the USA Freedom Act are "not here to strip the intelligence community of the tools to fight terrorism. ...What we are here to do is to provide the American people with the certainty that the federal government is working without violating their constitutional rights."Last week, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals handed a victory to opponents of the NSA program. It declared that the Patriot Act’s Section 215 did not authorize the NSA to engage in sweeping collection of U.S. phone records and is therefore illegal.Senators face a deadline of June 1, when the Patriot Act provisions expire.
There's only a couple of weekly shows that I like to watch and both of them use Apple products. "Less Than Perfect" uses the older model Cinema Displays, but the paste a tacky piece of paper with the company's logo over the Apple logo. The other night I was watching "Boston Legal" and they were using a Powerbook, but it had a piece of metal stuck to the back of the display over the Apple logo. On that show maybe the producers wouldn't think we'd notice - but with HDTV they can't get away with much.Do they have to pay Apple to use their productsIf not, it doesn't make any sense to me, and really just shows me how out of touch these producers really are by taking the chance to alienate those who are a part of the pop cultural icon of the Apple brand.
Following President Juncker’s State of the Union speech, MEPs showed their belief in the importance of stricter and clearer transparency standards, with 368 votes for, 161 against and 60 abstentions. MEPs want legislative information and documents to be directly accessible to the public throughout the legislative process. The report by Sven Giegold (Greens, DE) notes that more efforts are needed to make trade negotiations more transparent. Mandatory transparency register Furthermore, MEPs call for a more robust transparency register of interest groups and representatives, which they believe should be mandatory. Financing, support and the clients of these organisations should be declared on a yearly basis. MEPs are asked to only meet with interest group representatives once they are officially registered, or to ask them to register. They urge the Council to adopt similar rules. The report also supports rapporteurs, shadow rapporteurs and committee chairs to declare their meetings with interest groups representatives for the dossiers which they are in charge of. Quote Sven Giegold (Greens, DE) “The European Parliament made a big leap forward to address the feeling of too much collusion of politics and big business. The long struggle for more transparency and stronger ethics rules has paid off and allows confidence in the EU institutions to rise. By implementing our demands, the EU institutions can now become the pioneer in lobbying transparency.” In reaction to President Juncker’s proposal for a revision of the Code of Conduct and with regard to the Commission’s Ethics Committee, he added: “The Commission’s ethics committee was rebranded as “independent”. MEPs will not accept the Commission’s fraudulent labelling. The Commission has to stop hand-picking its own Ethics Committee if it is ever supposed to become credible, and to sanction those who breach the Code of Conduct.”
Twelve months ago, a white supremacist walked into a Milwaukee-area Sikh (seek') temple and opened fire on worshippers he didn't know. He killed six people, devastating a Sikh community whose religion is based on peace and forgiveness. Monday is the one-year anniversary of the shooting at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek. Temple officials are planning to honor the dead with a candlelight vigil and quiet religious observances. They say they want to show the world that the best way to stand against violence is to come together in kindness and love. On Friday, temple priests will begin a 48-hour reading of the holy book. The next day will be a 6-kilometer (3.7-mile) run in honor of the six victims. The candlelight vigil will be Monday night.
Donald Trump signs an executive order on Feb. 3, 2017 in the Oval Office. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque The White House has just released a copy of the executive order that President Donald Trump signed earlier Friday on the fiduciary rule. The fiduciary rule, which the Department of Labor passed last year, intended to prevent financial advisers from giving conflicted advice to retirement savers. The rule had been set to go into effect this April. The executive order gives power to the Secretary of Labor to rescind or revise the rule. In the executive order, Trump writes that the fiduciary rule "may significantly alter the manner in which Americans can receive financial advice, and may not be consistent with the policies of my Administration." Trump's order directs the Secretary of Labor to "prepare an updated economic and legal analysis" of three areas: whether the rule, anticipated to be implemented in April, has "harmed or is likely to harm investors due to a reduction of Americans' access to certain retirement savings offerings, retirement product structures, retirement savings information, or related financial advice;" whether the rule has disrupted the retirement advice industry "that may adversely affect investors or retirees" and whether the rule is " likely to cause an increase in litigation, and an increase in the prices that investors and retirees must pay to gain access to retirement services." If any of those three points are met, or if the rule is found to hurt Americans' ability to gain access to retirement information and financial advice, the Secretary of Labor must rescind or revise the rule, according to the order. You can read the full text of the executive order below. For more background on the fiduciary rule and what's at stake, read Business Insider's explainer here. THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE February 3, 2017 February 3, 2017 MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF LABOR SUBJECT: Fiduciary Duty Rule One of the priorities of my Administration is to empower Americans to make their own financial decisions, to facilitate their ability to save for retirement and build the individual wealth necessary to afford typical lifetime expenses, such as buying a home and paying for college, and to withstand unexpected financial emergencies. The Department of Labor's (Department) final rule entitled, Definition of the Term "Fiduciary"; Conflict of Interest Rule ‑‑ Retirement Investment Advice, 81Fed. Reg. 20946 (April 8, 2016) (Fiduciary Duty Rule or Rule), may significantly alter the manner in which Americans can receive financial advice, and may not be consistent with the policies of my Administration. Accordingly, by the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby direct the following: Section 1. Department of Labor Review of Fiduciary Duty Rule. (a) You are directed to examine the Fiduciary Duty Rule to determine whether it may adversely affect the ability of Americans to gain access to retirement information and financial advice. As part of this examination, you shall prepare an updated economic and legal analysis concerning the likely impact of the Fiduciary Duty Rule, which shall consider, among other things, the following: (i) Whether the anticipated applicability of the Fiduciary Duty Rule has harmed or is likely to harm investors due to a reduction of Americans' access to certain retirement savings offerings, retirement product structures, retirement savings information, or related financial advice; (ii) Whether the anticipated applicability of the Fiduciary Duty Rule has resulted in dislocations or disruptions within the retirement services industry that may adversely affect investors or retirees; and (iii) Whether the Fiduciary Duty Rule is likely to cause an increase in litigation, and an increase in the prices that investors and retirees must pay to gain access to retirement services. (b) If you make an affirmative determination as to any of the considerations identified in subsection (a) ‑‑ or if you conclude for any other reason after appropriate review that the Fiduciary Duty Rule is inconsistent with the priority identified earlier in this memorandum ‑‑ then you shall publish for notice and comment a proposed rule rescinding or revising the Rule, as appropriate and as consistent with law. Sec. 2. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this memorandum shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect: (i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or (ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals. (b) This memorandum shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations. (c) This memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person. (d) You are hereby authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register. DONALD J. TRUMP ###
There used to be, if you will allow an old man to reminisce, what was almost an art to buying things from Supreme. Not the ordinary things like decks or wheels or griptape—if you were an actual skater you were treated like an actual customer—but the hard-to-get stuff like its Nike Dunks or particularly sought-after T-shirts and five-panel hats. There was a release day, sure, but in those wild pre-Twitter (and pre-online shop) days, this info wasn’t widely distributed. You had to know it, or at least know somebody. And everything wasn’t just placed out on display, either. You had to ask. And if that day’s arbitrary allotment was sold out, well, better luck tomorrow. Selling out on the first day wasn’t the idea. When the Dunk Highs released in 2002, I eventually got the whole set, going back again and again over the course of a week or more. This, of course, is no longer possible. <span></span> Here’s how a Supreme drops works now, for those who aren’t familiar. Generally, word gets out of something new dropping early in the week, or maybe the week before. Releases happen on Thursdays, and the lineup starts at least a day before. In the case of the much-heralded Foamposites—which wound up not even selling at the New York store—it was more like a couple of days before. Simultaneous with the shop doors opening up, products launch online at 11 a.m., which means thousands of people around the world are fervently clicking “refresh” from 10:55 on. Wait for the official e-mail, and whatever was most sought after will already be long gone. For those who can’t line up and miss that crucial first few minutes of an online drop, well, sorry. Best of luck with the resellers. POST CONTINUES BELOW There has to be a better way, right? Of course. Supreme could go back to only selling a certain amount of the high-demand products every day, ensuring they’d last at least through the weekend, which would at least theoretically give everyone a shot. (Random restocks on the web could do the same thing—although these actually do happen when some of the first-thing orders are inevitably denied or cancelled.) Barring that, though, what to do? Here’s an idea: Buy different shit. Yes, the box logo tee is a classic, and yes, the latest leopard-print, half-suede, neon pink five panel will get beaucoup likes on the ‘Gram. But not only is that not all Supreme makes, it’s not even necessarily the best stuff Supreme makes. Ditto on the collabs. Vans and Nike and Comme des Garçons is nice and all, but ask yourself this: Are you buying the Supreme stuff you buy because you like it, or because it’s a real-life equivalent of a “First!” comment? And do you really want to be out there wearing the same thing as everyone else (albeit on a much smaller scale than, say, the newest Jordan retros)? Oh, hey, you got the Taxi Driver T-shirt too, huh? Sorry you got stuck with the yellow XL. POST CONTINUES BELOW Here’s another idea: Treat Supreme like a clothing store, not a sneaker boutique. Sometimes it seems like product sellouts become a self-fulfilling prophecy—something gets so hyped up that the first people in line buy it whether they actually want it or not. It sells out even faster because people are worried it’ll sell out. Or people settle for colors they’d never, ever buy otherwise just to get the “right” thing. “At least I won’t lose money on it,” becomes the battle cry. Get it together. Leave the T-shirt rack alone, cross to the other side of the store, and check out some of the cut-and-sew stuff. Funny how some people who don’t think twice about dropping $40 on a T-shirt or $250 on a pair of sneakers will balk at $118 for a button-up or $138 for a pair of jeans. Maybe get something that will stay in the rotation beyond that first, magical week. POST CONTINUES BELOW There’s nothing inherently wrong with liking the same thing a lot of other people do. After all, someone has to like something on its own merit for it to become popular in the first place. But at the same time, that one item shouldn’t blind you to the other options. If you don’t get that box logo tee or other item du jour, the world isn’t going to come to an end. If you play it right, it’ll actually open up. Russ Bengtson is a senior staff writer who owns way too much supreme but has never camped out on Lafayette street.
Although the relationship between endocrine and immune systems is well documented, few studies have been performed on autoimmune disorders other than those that are sex hormone-related. We studied a murine model of autoimmune diabetes, showing that growth hormone (GH) modifies the immune response to render diabetic mice resistant to disease development. The mechanism involves a GH-mediated effect on β-cell survival and/or proliferation and a direct effect on immune cells. GH triggers a cytokine environment that promotes anti-inflammatory macrophage polarization, maintains the activity of the suppressor T cells, and limits Th17 cell plasticity. This study provides evidence of the importance of endocrine control of immune functions and indicates that therapies based on GH analogs should be considered for treatment of autoimmune diabetes. Abstract Evidence supports a relationship between the neuroendocrine and the immune systems. Data from mice that overexpress or are deficient in growth hormone (GH) indicate that GH stimulates T and B-cell proliferation and Ig synthesis, and enhances maturation of myeloid progenitor cells. The effect of GH on autoimmune pathologies has nonetheless been little studied. Using a murine model of type 1 diabetes, a T-cell–mediated autoimmune disease characterized by immune cell infiltration of pancreatic islets and destruction of insulin-producing β-cells, we observed that sustained GH expression reduced prodromal disease symptoms and eliminated progression to overt diabetes. The effect involves several GH-mediated mechanisms; GH altered the cytokine environment, triggered anti-inflammatory macrophage (M2) polarization, maintained activity of the suppressor T-cell population, and limited Th17 cell plasticity. In addition, GH reduced apoptosis and/or increased the proliferative rate of β-cells. These results support a role for GH in immune response regulation and identify a unique target for therapeutic intervention in type 1 diabetes.
Joey Barton has admitted he once fouled Xabi Alonso after the Spaniard “stole his move to Liverpool”. Barton was sent off for a poorly-timed challenge on Alonso in a 3-0 Liverpool win over Newcastle in 2009. In his new autobiography, ‘No Nonsense’, the suspended Rangers midfielder has detailed how the tackle was partly down to jealousy, with Alonso having “stolen” his move to Anfield five years prior. ‘Had things panned out differently, I could have made the obsessive debate about the mutual suitability of the Gerrard-Lampard axis redundant,’ Barton writes. ‘From what I gathered, Steven Gerrard agitated to get Liverpool to sign me in 2004, because he felt we had the potential to forge a partnership. ‘I met with Gerard Houllier at Melwood, and agreed everything verbally. ‘A deal was close to being concluded but then he was sacked that summer. It was never revived.’ On the 2009 tackle in particular, Barton added:
Posted on November 25, 2012 Kristol: "Republicans Are Going Into Contortions" Defending Millionaires BILL KRISTOL: The Republicans are going into contortions to try not to raise the top rate, while in fact trying to produce more revenues, which Speaker Boehner said he's for, and to produce them from the wealthy. They're so scared of being accused of attacking the middle class. I don't really care if they want to find a complicated way to get more revenues, I suppose. I think it is probably easier just to give in a little bit on the top rate. But, they made that a matter of dogma and I'm not going to break my own sword on telling them not to break their sword on it but I'll point out, what is the one tax rate that's going up on January 1st that's no one is talking about and apparently both parties are now going to collude to let go of. The payroll tax, remember that? That was cut to 12% from 10% two years ago. It's been 10% the last two years. And I gather the Republicans have no problem -- I don't know if Grover Norquist has a problem -- with letting working class and middle class Americans have a 2% tax increase, and, that is not currently the Republican position that the payroll tax cut should be extended. And the administration is quietly happy to let that go, because God forbid they should actually cut entitlements from wealthy seniors or for others who benefit from corporate capitalism and big government. So we have collusion among the elites form both parties that the one tax that is going to go up, if there's a deal of January 1st, is the payroll tax, which I think is wrong. And Republicans have a huge opportunity here to be champions of the working class and middle class, instead of screaming and yelling about millionaires.
I'm not sure what "LessGovernment" has to do with Al Jazeera, but Judge Napolitano and Glenn Beck's bookers took the opportunity to let their spokesmouth, Seton Motley (yes, that IS his name), come on and "analyze" them after Hillary Clinton's remarks and praise of their broadcasts. Mr. Motley starts out with some incoherence about campaigning in prose and broadcasting in Arabic before launching into an indictment of Hillary Clinton as a "leftist" who likes "leftist reporting". Oh, and then there's that thing about how Al Jazeera is no different than any US mainstream outlet because they all bash the Tea Party. NAPOLITANO: ...can get real news around the clock. Is Secretary Clinton right? Is Al Jazeera one of the few sources left for real news and should we welcome it here in America? Here now to discuss is Seton Motley, president of Less Government. Well that's a great name for your organization - Less Government. Seton, welcome back to the Glenn Beck program. What is she talking about? Is Al Jazeera to be trusted? In English? Or in another language? MOTLEY: Well, there's an old campaign saw. You campaign in poetry, you govern in prose, and Al Jazeera campaigns in English and governs in Arabic. And if you're watching Al Jazeera Arabic you get a whole different perspective on what's going on over there than what you do over here. Part of the reason it hasn't taken off greater here in America - the English version - is because it's just like ABC, NBC, CBS. I watched segments today where they're just bashing the Tea Party just like NBC does, ABC does, so there's no difference. Alrighty then. It certainly couldn't have anything to do with the refusal of all cable providers to actually CARRY Al Jazeera, right? No, it's just because they're no different than the others. I'm truly not sure that this guy has ever really watched Al Jazeera for any length of time, but get a load of his next "analysis". NAPOLITANO: All right, but do they have a message that they convey about behavior that goes over there that either we don't get from our own home-grown media -- Fox or CNN or whoever might be there -- and are they trustworthy? Or is this a propaganda arm of some government? MOTLEY: I get this -- there's station Qatar and there's station Kuwait and they're based out of those two countries. And I -- I think it's a propaganda arm. I mean if you watch -- uh, there's a great website, MEMRI.org, Middle East Media and Research Institute -- If you watch Al Jazeera's Arabic language clips, it's presenting all kinds of crazy. You've got people saying jihadist things all the time, they reported on a British citizen who joined the Taliban and said "death to Americans". If they presented that here, I think they would get ratings, I think they would get viewership, I think there would be a clamor for what they're doing. But they're not presenting that over here. They're presenting it over there and not giving it to us here. So that I understand him, I read it twice after I transcribed it myself. I think he is saying that IF they presented video that painted Arabs as crazy people who are out to kill Americans they'd get ratings. But because they don't do that on AJE, they're not viable? Is that really what he's saying? Well, it takes a propagandist to know one, after all, but I think he should actually WATCH what they do on both. I've watched AJE and AJArabic, and when it's live, it's often the very same video. One in English, the other in Arabic. While I don't speak Arabic, I'm not really inclined to believe the Arabic version is a propaganda version that Americans would love, are you? And finally, all Fox/Beck viewers are admonished to beware that raving leftist, Hillary Clinton. NAPOLITANO: All right, last question since we have 30 seconds. Why is Hillary Clinton saying this? Why is she, of all people, telling Americans to watch it? MOTLEY: Because I think they have a similar agenda to what leftists like Hillary Clinton want to see advanced here. So this is another network that does what MSNBC, CNN and ABC does. NAPOLITANO: Got it. I'm glad Napolitano got it, because I'm still scratching my head. There's propaganda all right, but it's not being aired on Al Jazeera. I'm starting to think maybe I should've stayed with the whales and fish another week.
Abstract This paper describes the process that we follow at Instaclustr to design a Cassandra data model for our customers. While not a prescriptive, formal process it does define phases and steps that our team follows when we are design a new data model for our customers: Phase 1: Understand the data Phase 2: Define the entities Phase 3: Review & tune As well as defining the process we also provide a worked example based on building a database to store and retrieve log messages from multiple servers. Overview We recently published a blog post on the most common data modelling mistakes that we see with Cassandra. This post was very popular and led me to think about what advice we could provide on how to approach designing your Cassandra data model so as to come up with a quality design that avoids the traps. There are a number of good articles around that with rules and patterns to fit your data model into: 6 Step Guide to Apache Cassandra Data Modelling and Data Modelling Recommended Practices However, we haven’t found a step by step guide to analysing your data to determine how to fit in these rules and patterns. This white paper is a quick attempt at filling that gap. Phase 1: Understand the data This phase has two distinct steps that are both designed to gain a good understanding of the data that you are modelling and the access patterns required. Define the data domain The first step is to get a good understanding of your data domain. As someone very familiar with relation data modelling, I tend to sketch (or at least think) ER diagrams to understand the entities, their keys and relationships. However, if you’re familiar with another notation then it would likely work just as well. The key things you need to understand at a logical level are: • What are the entities (or objects) in your data model? • What are the primary key attributes of the entities? • What are the relationships between the entities (i.e. references from one to the other)? • What is the relative cardinality of the relationships (i.e. if you have a one to many is it one to 10 or one to 10,000 on average)? Basically, these are the same things you’d expect in from logical ER model (although we probably don’t need a complete picture of all the attributes) along with a complete understanding of the cardinality of relationships that you’d normally need for a relational model. An understanding of the demographics of key attributes (cardinality, distribution) will also be useful in finalising your Cassandra model. Also, understand which key attributes are fixed and which change over the life of a record. Define the required access patterns The next step, or quite likely a step carried out in conjunction with step 1, is to understand how you will need to access your data: List out the paths you will follow to access the data, such as: Start with a customer id, search for transactions in a date range and then look up all the details about a particular transaction from the search resultsStart with a particular server and metric, retrieve x metrics values in ascending age Start with a particular server and metric, retrieve x metrics values in ascending age starting at a particular point in time. For a given sensor, retrieve all readings of multiple metrics for a given day. For a given sensor, retrieve the current value. Remember that any updates of a record are an access path that needs to be considered Determine which accesses are the most crucial from a performance point of view – are there some which need to be as quick as possible while performance requirements for others allow time for multiple reads or range scans? Remember that you need a pretty complete understanding of how you will access your data at this stage – part of the trade-off for Cassandra’s performance, reliability and scalability is a fairly restricted set of methods for accessing data in a particular table. Phase 2: Understand the entities This phase has two specific steps designed to gain an understanding of both the primary and secondary entities associated with the data. Identify primary access entities Now we’re moving from analysing your data domain and application requirements to starting to design your data model. You really want to be pretty solid on steps 1 and 2 before moving on to this stage. The idea here is to denormalize your data into the smallest number of tables possible based on your access patterns. For each lookup by key that your access patterns require, you will need a table to satisfy that lookup. I’ve coined the term primary access entity to describe the entity your using for the lookup (for example, a lookup by client id is using client as the primary access entity, a lookup by server and metric name is using a server-metric entity as the primary access entity). The primary access entity defines the partition level (or grain if you’re familiar with dimensional modelling) of the resulting denormalized table (i.e. there will be one partition in the table for each instance of the primary access entity). You may choose to satisfy some access patterns using secondary indexes rather than complete replicas of the data with a different primary access entity. Keep in mind that columns in include in a secondary index should have a significantly lower cardinality than the table being indexed and be aware of the frequency of updates of the indexed value. For the example access patterns above, we would define the following primary access entities: customer and transaction (get a list of transactions from the customer entity and then use that to look up transaction details from the transaction entity) to look up transaction details from the transaction entity) server-metric sensor sensor Allocate secondary entities The next step is to find a place to store the data that belongs to entities that have not been chosen as primary access entities (I’ll call these entities secondary entities). You can choose to: Push down by taking data from a parent secondary entity (one side) of a one to many relationship and storing multiple copies of it at the primary access entity level (for example, storing customer phone number in each customer order record); or by taking data from a parent secondary entity (one side) of a one to many relationship and storing multiple copies of it at the primary access entity level (for example, storing customer phone number in each customer order record); or Push up by taking data from the child secondary entity (many side) of a one to many relationship and storing it at the primary access entity level either by use of cluster keys or by use of multi-value types (list and maps) (for example adding a list of line items to a transaction level table). For some secondary entities, there will only be one related primary access entity and so there is no need to choose where and which direction to push. For other entities, you will need to choose will need to choose which primary access entities to push the data into. For optimal read performance, you should push a copy of the data to every primary access entity that is used as an access path for the data in the secondary entity. However, this comes at an insert/update performance and application complexity cost of maintaining multiple copies the data. This trade-off between read performance and data maintenance cost needs to be judged in the context of the specific performance requirements of your application. The other decision to be made at this stage is between using a cluster key or a multi-value type for pushing up. In general: Use a clustering key where there is only one child secondary entity to push up and particularly where the child secondary entity itself has children to roll-up. where the child secondary entity itself has children to roll-up. Use multi-value types where there are multiple child entities to push up into the primary entity Note that these rules are probably oversimplified but serve as a starting point for more detailed consideration. Phase 3: Review & Tune The last phase provides an opportunity to review the data model, test and to tune as necessary. Review partition & cluster keys Entering this stage, you have all the data you need to store allocated to a table or tables and your tables support accessing that data according to your required access patterns. The next step is to check that the resulting data model makes efficient use of Cassandra and, if not, to adjust. The items to check and adjust at this stage are: Do your partition keys have sufficient cardinality? If not, it may be necessary to move columns from the clustering key to the partition key (e.g. changing primary key (client_id, timestamp) to primary key ((client_id, timestamp))) or introduce new columns which group multiple cluster keys into partitions (e.g. changing primary key (client_id, timestamp) to primary key ((client_id, day), timestamp). If not, it may be necessary to move columns from the clustering key to the partition key (e.g. changing primary key (client_id, timestamp) to primary key ((client_id, timestamp))) or introduce new columns which group multiple cluster keys into partitions (e.g. changing primary key (client_id, timestamp) to primary key ((client_id, day), timestamp). Will the values in your partition keys be updated frequently? Updates of a primary key value will result in deletion and re-insertion of the record which can result in issues with tombstones. For example, trying to maintain a table with all clients of a particular status, you might have primary key (status, client ID). However, this will result in a delete and re-insert every time a client’s status changes. This would be a good candidate to use a set or list data type rather than including client ID as the cluster key. Updates of a primary key value will result in deletion and re-insertion of the record which can result in issues with tombstones. For example, trying to maintain a table with all clients of a particular status, you might have primary key (status, client ID). However, this will result in a delete and re-insert every time a client’s status changes. This would be a good candidate to use a set or list data type rather than including client ID as the cluster key. Is the number of records in each partition bounded? Extremely large partitions and/or very unevenly sized partitions can cause issues. For example, if you have a client_updates table with primary key (client_id, update_timestamp) there is potentially no limit to how many times a particular client record can be update and you may have significant unevenness if you have a small number of clients that have been around for 10 years and most clients only having a day or two’s history. This is another example where it’s useful to introduce new columns which group multiple cluster keys into partitions partitions (e.g. changing primary key (client_ id, update_timestamp) to primary key ((client_id, month), update_timestamp). Test and tune The final step is perhaps the most important – test your data model and tune it as required. Keep in mind that issues like partitions or rows growing too large or tombstones building up in a table may only become visible after days (or longer) of use under real-world load. It’s therefore important to test as closely as possible to real-world load and to monitor closely for any warning signs (the nodetool cfstats and cfhistograms commands are very useful for this). At this stage you may also consider tuning some of the settings that effect the physical storage of your data. For example: changing compaction strategy; reducing gc_grace_seconds if you are only deleting data using TTL; or setting caching options. A Worked Example To illustrate this, I’ll walk through a basic example based on building a database to store and retrieve log messages from multiple servers. Note this is quite simplified compared to most real-world requirements. Step 1: Define the data domain The previous ER diagram illustrated the data domain. We have: Lots (millions) of log messages which have a timestamp and a body. Although message ID is shown as the primary key in the ER diagram, message time plus message type is an alternate primary key. shown as the primary key in the ER diagram, message time plus message type is an alternate primary key. Each log message has a message type and types are further grouped into a message category (for example, a message type might be “out of memory error” and category might be “error”). There a couple of hundred message types and around 20 categories. (for example, a message type might be “out of memory error” and category might be “error”). There a couple of hundred message types and around 20 categories. Each log message comes from a message source. The message source is the server that generated the message. There are 1000s of servers in our system. Each message source has a source type to categorise the source (e.g. red hat server, ubuntu server, windows server, router, etc.). There are around 20 source types. There are ~10,000 messages per source per day. generated the message. There are 1000s of servers in our system. Each message source has a source type to categorise the source (e.g. red hat server, ubuntu server, windows server, router, etc.). There are around 20 source types. There are ~10,000 messages per source per day. The message body can be parsed and stored as multiple message parts (basically key, value pairs). There is typically less than 20 parts per message. Step 2: Define the required access patterns We need to be able to: Retrieve all available information about the most recent 10 messages for a given source (and be able to work back in time from there). be able to work back in time from there). Retrieve all available information about the most recent 10 message for a given source type. Step 3: Identify primary access entities There are two primary access entities here – source and source type. The cardinality (~20) of source type makes it a good candidate for a secondary index so we will use source as the primary access entity and add a secondary index for source type. Step 4: Allocate secondary entities In this example, this step is relatively simple as all data needs to roll into the log source primary access entity. So we: Push down source type name Push down message category and message type to log message Push up log message as the clustering key for the new entity Push up message part as a map type with. The end result is that would be a single table with a partition key of source ID and a clustering key of (message time, message type). Step 5: Review partition and cluster keys Checking these partition and cluster keys against the checklist: Do your partition keys have sufficient cardinality? Yes, there are 1000s of sources. Will the values in your partition keys being updated frequently? No, all the data is write-once. Is the number of records in each partition bounded? No – messages could build up indefinitely over time. So, we need to address the unbound partition size. A typical pattern to address that in time series data such as this is to introduce a grouping of time periods into the cluster key. In this case 10,000 messages per day is a reasonable number to include in one partition so we’ll use day as part of our partition key. The resulting Cassandra table will look some like: CREATE TABLE example.log_messages ( message_id uuid, source_name text, source_type text, message_type text, message_urgency int, message_category text, message_time timestamp, message_time_day text, message_body text, message_parts map<text, frozen > PRIMARY KEY ((source_name, message_time_day, message_time, message_type) ) WITH CLUSTERING ORDER BY (message_time DESC); CREATE INDEX log_messages_sourcetype_idx ON example.log_messages (source_type); 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 CREATE TABLE example . log_messages ( message_id uuid , source_name text , source_type text , message_type text , message_urgency int , message_category text , message_time timestamp , message_time_day text , message_body text , message_parts map & lt ; text , frozen & gt ; PRIMARY KEY ( ( source_name , message_time_day , message_time , message_type ) ) WITH CLUSTERING ORDER BY ( message_time DESC ) ; CREATE INDEX log_messages_sourcetype_idx ON example . log_messages ( source_type ) ; Conclusion Hopefully, this process and basic example will help you start to get familiar with Cassandra data modelling. We’ve only covered a basic implementation that fits well with Cassandra, however there are many other examples on the web which can help you work through more complex requirements. Instaclustr also provides our customers with data modelling review and assistance, so get in touch with us if you need some hands-on assistance.
The CEO of General Electric Co. on Wednesday slammed President Trump’s executive order rolling back former President Obama's climate change efforts in an internal memo, pledging his company will continue its efforts to combat climate change. “Companies must be resilient and learn to adjust to political volatility all over the world,” Jeff Immelt wrote in the company blog post, according to Politico. ”Companies must have their own ‘foreign policy’ and create technology and solutions that address local needs for our customers and society.” ADVERTISEMENT Immelt stressed the importance of sticking with the Paris agreement, the landmark international climate deal reached in 2015 that Trump opposes. “We believe climate change should be addressed on a global basis through multinational agreements, such as the Paris Agreement,” he wrote. “We hope that the United States continues to play a constructive role in furthering solutions to these challenges, and at GE, we will continue to lead with our technology and actions.” Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt has criticized the climate accord, calling it a “bad deal.” "You know, what was wrong with Paris was not just that it was, you know, failed to be treated as a treaty, but China and India, the largest producers of CO2 internationally, got away scot-free," Pruitt said in a Sunday interview. "They didn’t have to take steps until 2030. So we’ve penalized ourselves through lost jobs while China and India didn’t take steps to address the issue internationally," he continued. "So Paris was just a bad deal, in my estimation."
"You think about it like a pilot or development — you take a swing and hope it works. In this case, it didn’t work," said programming president Casey Bloys. "And you move on." HBO's top brass is finally opening up about its scrapped Jon Stewart project. "You think about it like a pilot or development — you take a swing and hope it works. In this case, it didn’t work. And you move on," the premium cable network's programming president Casey Bloys told reporters Wednesday at the Television Critics Association's summer press tour. "What Jon was trying to do, which was to get an animation turnaround time of one day, is a very difficult thing to do," the exec went on to explain, noting that the project centered on sophisticated animation that would involve, for example, facial expressions that could convey comedy. Stewart was ultimately able to get the turnaround time to about two days. "It’s very difficult to do. There’s a reason it hasn’t been done." Bloys noted that there were technical issues on both the distribution side of things as well as the animation one. "Once Jon realized that he could get close on the animation, what he realized also was in terms of the quality control and in terms of the writing, when you’re putting something out a couple of times a day, the quality control still has to be here," Bloys said. "It just got to a point where it was like, is this worth his time? Is this worth our time? We kind of thought, ‘You know what? It was a good try, but ultimately not worth it.’” Instead, HBO announced Wednesday that Stewart's next venture would be a pair of stand-up specials. The pair marks the first specials for the comedian since his debut effort in 1996, Jon Stewart: Unleavened, which also aired on the pay cabler. When asked if the network was in discussions with Stewart about other collaborations, Bloys confirmed that there will be additional projects coming. "Yes, there'll be other things. As a producer, I'm sure he's got other ideas that he's thinking about," he said. Could one of those ideas be a late-night series? "I'd be happy if he would, but I don't think that's where his mind is right now." Back in May, HBO announced it would not be moving forward with its plans for a shortform animation venture from the former Daily Show host, a collaboration that was announced with heavy fanfare in November 2015 as part of a four-year production deal. Stewart was set to work with cloud-graphics company OTOY to develop new technology that would allow him to produce timely shortform digital content. “Appearing on television 22 minutes a night clearly broke me," Stewart said at the time. "I’m pretty sure I can produce a few minutes of content every now and again." In confirming the news that it would be forgoing the mysterious animation venture, HBO was careful to emphasize that both the network and Stewart together agreed to shelve the project, which sources say turned out to be more complicated than either party initially expected. "HBO and Jon Stewart have decided not to proceed with a shortform digital animated project," the pair said in a joint statement at the time. "We all thought the project had great potential but there were technical issues in terms of production and distribution that proved too difficult given the quick turnaround and topical nature of the material.” The idea had been for the material to be refreshed on HBO's digital platforms, including HBO Now and HBO Go, multiple times throughout the day. But sources say it was the one-day turnaround that became a sticking point for the project. From a technological standpoint, it became clear to those involved that it would be next to impossible to create and distribute the sophisticated animation within the short window. The project had already been delayed due to its technological complexity. At one point, the digital shorts were expected to debut ahead of the presidential election, so as to provide commentary on the campaigns — but when challenges arose, HBO reportedly told Stewart he could have as much time as he needed to get it right.
PENTAGON’s Shinwon will be temporarily be sitting out of the group’s activities due to a knee injury. Cube Entertainment revealed on October 24 that during a Naver V App broadcast on the evening of October 22, Shinwon had complained of pain in his knee, after which he was quickly taken to a nearby hospital for a checkup. Cube said, “According to the doctors, it is not a serious injury. However, they advised that Shinwon avoid strenuous activity and movement and focus on treatment. Shinwon himself also said that bringing his knee back to normal condition is his first priority, so we decided to halt his activities for the time being.” Despite the state of his knee, Shinwon was adamant that he be able to meet his fans, so he attended the fan meeting on October 23 on crutches. Cube stated that they would update fans with any new developments in Shinwon’s recovery. While Shinwon works on getting back on his feet, PENTAGON will be carrying out the group’s scheduled activities with nine members. Recently, SF9’s Taeyang also suspended his activities briefly due to a knee injury. Source (1)
There’s nothing hotter right now than starting your own libertarian-minded community from scratch. Or at least threatening to do so. Glenn Beck imagines building a community/theme park somewhere in the United States called Independence Park which would celebrate entrepreneurship and sustainable living. Others envision Idaho as the perfect spot to build a fortress-like libertarian utopia called The Citadel, where “Marxists, Socialists, Liberals, and Establishment Republicans” need not apply. Still others — like PayPal founder Peter Thiel – are drawn to the idea of floating cities in the ocean, a libertarian dream of the future called seasteading. But all of these dreams pale in comparison to the grand utopian vision of a 1978 film called Libra. Produced and distributed by a free-market group based in San Diego called World Research, Inc., the 40-minute film is set in the year 2003 and gives viewers a look at two vastly different worlds. On Earth, a world government has formed and everything is micromanaged to death, killing private enterprise. But in space, there’s true hope for freedom. The film explains that way back in 1978 a space colony community was formed using $50 billion of private funds. Back then, government regulations were just loose enough to allow them to form. But here in the year 2003, government regulators are trying to figure out a way to bring them back under their oppressive thumb through taxes and tariffs on the goods they ship back to Earth. The video starts with a rather ominous voice-over as the camera pushes in on a picture of the earth: Let’s face it. Your world is falling apart. Politicians engaging nations in wars against the will of the people. Increasing worldwide poverty and starvation. Inflation, high unemployment, staggering crime rates. Skyrocketing costs of nationalized health care. Overpopulation. Inability to meet your energy needs. Bankrupt cities, bankrupt states, bankrupt nations and morally bankrupt people. We then see that this is New York City in the year 2003. Needless to say, the film’s vision for 2003 isn’t very pleasant — at least for those left on Earth. The Earth has an International Planning Commission, which naturally feels threatened by the idea of “uncontrolled energy” being harnessed by the people who work on Libra. The people of Libra seem happy, while those on Earth cope with the world government’s dystopian top-down management of resources. The film follows an investment banker and a world government official who both travel to Libra on a fact-finding mission. The investment bankers are looking to invest in solar power and space manufacturing industries at Libra, while the world government senator is trying to figure out how he can rein in the renegade capitalists of Libra. On their journey to Libra in a space shuttle, the characters watch a film which explains how the space colony works. Here in space, the film explains, residents are free to “work, raise families and enjoy living.” The illustration on your screen shows the exterior design of Libra. Residents live in the central sphere. A rotation rate of approximately two revolutions per minute provides a gravity-like force which varies from zero gravity at the poles to full earth-like gravity at the equator. Inside the sphere, the land forms a big curving valley rising from the equator to 45 degrees on each side. The land area is mainly in the form of low-rise terraced apartments, shopping walkways and small parks with grass and trees. A small river flows gently along the line of the equator. You will notice the small scale of things. But for the 10,000 population there is more than adequate population. Later in the film viewers get an interesting peek into what daily life is like when a resident shows the investment banker her Abacus computer. The Abacus is a bit like Siri – if Siri only knew how to read you a copy of Consumer Reports. As the resident explains, “Abacus is one of the most popular consumer-information computers on Libra. These computing systems will give and receive information when you want it, where you want it and in the style you want it.” The Libra resident explains, “Now if you have any questions about products or services — anything from toothbrushes to a doctor’s qualifications, it can probably react to you better than I can, in any one of four languages!” On second thought, Abacus is actually less useful than Consumer Reports given the fact that it doesn’t make a recommendation for what it thinks is the best product or service. When the investment banker asks which wristwatch he should’ve purchased, the computer begins chanting, “freecision… freecision… freecision…” The woman explains that on Libra the computer won’t make any of your decisions for you, lest you become one of the mindless drones back on Earth: “Abacus won’t make it for you! It can’t decide what’s best for you! That’s your freesponsibility!” “Freesponsibility…” the investment banker says mulling over the concept. “That’s not a bad word.” “I know,” the woman replies. “It’s what’s been attracting more and more regulation refugees from Earth.” Ultimately, the biggest concern of the corrupt world government revolves around cheap energy being produced which competes with their stranglehold on regulating the world’s energy supply. The senator goes on international TV to debate Dr. Baker from the Libra space colony. Dr. Baker is a sort of uber-Galt who preaches the gospel of free enterprise and makes a fool of the senator during their debate. By the end of the film we’re left to wonder if the senator is a believer in world government anymore. With a long gaze into his eyes, viewers can imagine that he will soon join the others as a “regulation refugee.” You can watch the entire film over at AV Geeks.
The Liquigas-Doimo soigneur waited patiently in the shade for Ivan Basso to finish the stage in Pau. Related Articles Pro bike: Ivan Basso's Liquigas Cannondale SuperSix Hi-Mod Basso counts on experience against Tour young guns Basso promises to return to the Tour Basso was not in the front group that finished 6:45 behind Pierrick Fédrigo (Bbox Bouygues Telecom) and included most of the overall contenders. He was not even in the first gruppetto, with teammates Daniel Oss and Francesco Bellotti, that finished 23:42 down. Basso eventually finished the 199.5km stage in 111th place, 34:48 behind Fédrigo. The huge loss of time means that Basso is now 24th overall, 37:18 behind Alberto Contador. The Giro d'Italia winner had been suffering with bronchitis since Monday afternoon and was weakened by the antibiotics the Liquigas-Doimo team doctor had given him to cure the problem and reduce a temperature. He had been targeting a Giro d'Italia-Tour de France double but now he just hopes to finish the Tour in Paris on Sunday. When Basso crossed the line he did not stop when the soigneur held out a drink and did not want to talk to the Italian media that were also waiting for him. He rode past them all, with dried saliva on his lips and a blank, fatigued emptiness in his eyes. He eventually spoke after recovering from over six difficult hours in the saddle. Like every other rider who had ridden the Giro d'Italia, his hopes of success at the Tour de France had faded during the third week of the Tour de France. Winning the now much tougher Giro and then an intense and constantly demanding Tour de France seems too much of a test for anyone. "I'm really tired and worn out, it was an incredibly tough day,' Basso said. "I started the stage to honour the race because even my directeur sportif told me not to start. But I've never liked retiring and so I tried to hang on and stay in the Tour. "This has been a tough Tour for me that always seemed to be uphill. Right from the start in Rotterdam it was more difficult that I think we all expected. This illness has made it almost impossible. "Now I just want to think about the rest day and cancel this bad day from mind. I'm not used to being in the gruppetto when the big-name riders are racing hard up front. I can promise you it's not much fun." Basso now just hopes to survive in the last mountain stage on Thursday and then reach Paris. Suddenly even just making to the Champs-Élysées will be a huge achievement for the Giro d'Italia winner.
Openbazaar Integrates Tor – The Platform's Most Requested Feature The decentralized marketplace Openbazaar has been continuously building its platform since inception. Now the Bitcoin-powered marketplace has finally merged Tor integration into the Openbazaar platform adding a long-awaited layer of privacy to the program. Also read: Paul Sztorc Discusses Bitcoin & Sidechains ‘Tor the Most Requested Feature By Far’ Openbazaar is a different approach to ecommerce. Through creating a decentralized peer-to-peer marketplace that’s censorship-resistant, participants are connected directly rather than depending on a centralized service such as Ebay or Amazon. The platform does not charge any fees and has no restrictions in regards to what can be purchased and sold. Openbazaar officially launched the platform in April of 2016 and has been preparing to revamp the marketplace with its 2.0 version. When Openbazaar was released, many bitcoiners continuously begged the development team for Tor integration. Tor is free software that enables private communication by redirecting internet traffic through thousands of relays. This layer of anonymity conceals a user’s location and traffic from network surveillance efforts. Back in September Openbazaar developer Chris Pacia told Bitcoin.com, “Tor has always been the most requested feature by far — but it’s always been a bit of a technical challenge to implement.” Openbazaar and Tor’s Relationship Begins on Valentine’s Day On February 14 the Openbazaar team showed the Bitcoin community some love by revealing the code for Tor integration was ready. Members of the community seemed thrilled as many of them exclaimed that Darknet Markets can now be created from home. One Redditor writes, “Bring on the illegal commerce”, while others were not so sure they wanted illicit activity coming to the network. Bitcoin.com decided to reach out to Openbazaar developer Chris Pacia to find out how he feels about finally releasing this integration into the wild. Pacia says he’s pleased the code has been merged but only recommends experimental use for the moment. “I’m happy we got it merged but there’s still more to do,” Pacia told Bitcoin.com. “At some point, we want to have a security audit for both Openbazaar and IPFS. Until we do that I wouldn’t recommend people using it for anything other than testing. Going forward there’s still a few more features to implement in the daemon and a bunch of tests to write. And most of the features need to be incorporated into the UI.” Openbazaar Marketplace Prepares for 2.0 As Bitcoin.com reported at the North American Bitcoin Conference, the founder of Openbazaar, Brian Hoffman, had revealed the release of the platform’s 2.0 developer version. Hoffman went over the many improvements the team was working on including an integrated wallet system and a better search engine. Openbazaar still has more work to do as far as development and user base traction is concerned. But with more privacy features a new flock of users may start participating. Furthermore, Pacia tells us the team could use a hand developing the platform. “We are currently looking for a javascript dev to help make the UI work go faster if anyone is interested.” What do you think about Openbazaar integrating Tor? Let us know in the comments below. Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Openbazaar, and Chris Pacia. Have you seen our new widget service? It allows anyone to embed informative Bitcoin.com widgets on their website. They’re pretty cool and you can customize by size and color. The widgets include price-only, price and graph, price and news, forum threads. There’s also a widget dedicated to our mining pool, displaying our hash power.
The year 2015 was quite the roller coaster for the Duggar family. They saw the ratings for their reality show 19 Kids and Counting soar at the beginning of the year, only to have the show cancelled later in the year after the whole “Our son Josh molested people” fiasco came to light. In December, however, the Duggars (sans Josh) made their way back to our TVs with three TLC specials entitled Jill & Jessa: Counting On. If the ratings for the specials indicate anything, it’s that America still cares about the Duggar family. In fact, all three special received relatively high ratings (especially the third installment, which showcased Jessa grunting out her first kid). While TLC has not confirmed that the Duggars will be back on the network in 2016, the ratings are pointing in that direction. According to the Nielson Company, the premiere episode of ‘Jill & Jessa’ on Sunday, December 13 garnered a rating of 0.8. (This indicates how many target viewers, aged 18-49, tuned in.) Over 2.2 million people watched the first episode of ‘Jill & Jessa.’ The second episode also did well, with a rating of 0.7 and a viewership of nearly 1.9 million. The most successful episode was the the third, with over 2.5 million people tuning in to watch Jessa give birth to The Spurge. The episode, which received a rating of 0.8, ranked in the Top 5 cable shows for the night. (To put this in perspective, ABC’s Shark Tank ranked a 0.5 that night, and had 1.91 million viewers.) While it is very unlikely that TLC will bring back ’19 Kids and Counting,’ it seemed that the network was “testing the waters” by airing these specials, to determine if viewers were still interested in seeing the Duggars on their TVs. The answer is “yes!” The Ashley has reached out to TLC for more information on the fate of ‘Jill & Jessa’ and will update this post when new info becomes available. (Photo: TLC)
Tom Friedman, who I admire in many ways, has an op-ed piece in today's NY Times where he suggests that the US government take the bailout money they are thinking of giving to the auto industry and instead give it to the top venture capital firms. You want to spend $20 billion of taxpayer money creating jobs? Fine. Call up the top 20 venture capital firms in America, which are short of cash today because their partners — university endowments and pension funds — are tapped out, and make them this offer: The U.S. Treasury will give you each up to $1 billion to fund the best venture capital ideas that have come your way. If they go bust, we all lose. If any of them turns out to be the next Microsoft or Intel, taxpayers will give you 20 percent of the investors’ upside and keep 80 percent for themselves. I understand the point Tom is making – that we ought to be investing in the future instead of the past. And for that, I applaud him. But the venture capital business, thankfully, does not need any more capital. It's got too much money in it, not too little. Just ask the limited partners who have been overfunding the venture capital business for the past 15-20 years what they think. You don't even need to ask them. They are taking money out of the sector because the returns have been weak. And the top 20 firms in the venture capital business are the least in need of a bailout of any group I've ever thought about. These firms, the Sequoias and Benchmarks and Accels and Kleiner Perkins etc etc can raise a fund anytime they want. Accel raised a ton of money last fall in the midst of the worst global financial meltdown in my lifetime. The venture capital business is an asset class where the top 10-20 percent of the firms make 80%+ of the returns. That's how its always been and that's how it will likely always be. It's because the best entrepreneurs want to work with firms with reputations for making money, making connections, recruting top talent, and getting the right exit at the right time. And those are the top 10-20 percent of the firms. So Tom's idea, while it looks good on paper, is a dream. The top venture firms don't want, don't need, and are never going to take government money. The same is true of the top entrepreneurs. The worst firms, on the other hand, will gladly accept government money. And that is what is going to happen with all of these government efforts to pour more money into the "innovation sector". That money will go to bad investors and weak entrepreneurs and management teams for the most part. It's a problem of adverse selection. If you take a look at all of the economically targeted investment programs that have been built and managed over the past twenty years in the venture capital industry, you'll see this plain and clearly. There are some good ideas out there. My friend Brad Feld told me about a new legislative effort in Colorado to give angel investors a 50% tax credit for making investments in early stage companies. That makes better sense to me. Let the market work but lubricate it a bit with tax credits, particularly for the angel sector which has been the most hurt in this downturn. But please leave the venture business alone. It's working pretty well as it is and it certainly doesn't need more money or some kind of stimulus plan.
The president breezed by his target of $60 million for the second quarter. Obama's record-smashing $86M haul President Barack Obama has shattered second quarter fundraising records for a White House incumbent by raising $86 million – a total that dwarfs the 2012 GOP field’s total take for the same period and that was substantially higher than his own target of $60 million. The shock-and-awe showing was announced by Obama 2012 Campaign Manager Jim Messina, wearing his signature blue dress shirt sans tie, in a web video blasted to supporters in the pre-dawn hours on Wednesday, two days before the 15,000-page combined Obama for America and Democratic National Committee report is due to go up on a government web site. Story Continued Below “It’s a monumental achievement,” said Messina, who pressed for donations until the last possible minute of the quarter – even offering supporters a chance to win a dinner with Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in exchange for a $5 donation. Earlier this month, Democratic fundraising sources close to the campaign told POLITICO that Obama would easily achieve his goal of besting former President George W. Bush’s combined take of $50.1 million at the same point in the 2004 election cycle. The total amount Obama raised in the first three months of 2011 also amounted to more than twice the $35 million raised collectively by the announced field of Republican presidential candidates. The Republican National Committee has raised an additional $30 million. Republicans downplayed the numbers, arguing that Obama is simply reaping the financial benefits of incumbency at a time when millions of Americans are looking for work. “We always knew Obama was the best fundraiser in history,” said RNC press secretary Kirsten Kuklowski. “Unfortunately for Americans, it’s clear that despite his claims that he’s focused on creating jobs, his priority is saving his own. Obama will need every penny of his billion dollars to defend his abysmal economic message.” The CliffsNotes version of the quarterly report, while impressive on its surface, left out crucial details that will be answered when the full version is posted, including Obama’s cash-on-hand, his expenditures, the names of his bundlers and the comparative amounts raised for the primary period and the general election. Messina said that most of the primary cash would be used to build statewide organizations, including one in Indiana, despite reports that Team Obama had essentially given up hopes of repeating its 2008 victory there. He also touted the campaign’s commitment to grassroots organizing, and the fact that the average donation to Obama’s non-DNC account was $69, lower even than the 2008 average contribution. Obama’s campaign organization had come under fire from some on the left who accused it of focusing too heavily on Democratic money players. “This should end any Washington chatter about whether or not our grassroots base will be engaged. Our supporters are back, they’re energized,” Messina later told reporters on a campaign conference call. Messina also took pains to lower expectations for the next reporting period, which is likely to feature a much less impressive take. “We are entering a difficult fundraising environment in the next quarter,” he told reporters. “Many folks tune out from the political process over the summer while they are spending time with their families or are away on vacation. We had some drop off in 2007 during this period and expect that can happen again.” The former deputy White House chief of staff, who spent much of the spring barnstorming around the country to stoke enthusiasm among big-dollar donors, didn’t immediately provide details on how much money was raised from contributions above $250. Those will be itemized on the Obama Victory Fund report due to be posted by the Federal Election Commission on Friday. So far, 552,462 people have contributed to the joint committee, a figure Messina described as “more grassroots support at this point in the process than any campaign in political history.” Officials with Obama’s Chicago-based campaign have downplayed reports that they plan to raise $1 billion by November, 2012, but they have said they hope to match or exceed the approximately $750 million he raised in 2008 – a small-donor fueled, internet-based effort that rewrote the presidential campaign playbook. Despite the massive haul, Messina still sought to cast the president as a financial underdog, emphasizing Obama’s refusal to take PAC or lobbyist cash – and hitting the GOP on its aggressive third-party fundraising effort in the wake of the Citizens United case. “It’s going to get tougher from here… GOP outside spending for 2012 will be as much as $500 million… This is a whole new ballgame like we’ve never faced before,” he added. Correction: An earlier version attributed the fundraising results to the first quarter of 2011. This version has been corrected. CORRECTION: Corrected by: Austin Wright @ 07/13/2011 08:56 PM Correction: An earlier version attributed the fundraising results to the first quarter of 2011. This version has been corrected.

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.