Prompt: 393352 06: (L to R) Actors Sarah Chalke, Zach Braff, and Donald Faison poses for a publicity photo for the television show 'Scrubs.' (Photo Courtesy of NBC/Getty Images) Donald Faison, who played Dr. Christopher Turk on the show "Scrubs," celebrates his birthday today, June 22. As "Scrubs" still has a lasting fan base -- the writers would call their cult following "Our Nerds" -- The Huffington Post has gathered 11 things from old interviews that you didn't know about your favorite gang of doctors, and they'll make you want to yell, "Eagle!" 1. The main cast went skinny dipping together

on Faison's birthday. Zach Braff, Sarah Chalke and Faison appeared on AOL's "Outside the Box" series and were asked by a fan about the weirdest or most memorable moment they'd had on or off the set. Faison told a story about the three of them going to the Bahamas for his birthday, where they went swimming in the ocean. While they waded in the waves, they could look into the distance and see a lightning storm adding beautiful touches of light to the horizon. Originally, Faison was just going to stop there, but then Braff said Faison should mention they were skinny dipping, as well. Chalke said she kept her swimsuit on, but Braff claimed that he and Faison were swimming naked together, "just like J.D. and Turk would." 2. J.D. and Turk were based on real doctors, one of which was "Scrubs" creator Bill Lawrence's best friend in college. Image: "Scrubs" In 2004, Bill Lawrence and Braff appeared on NPR's Fresh Air to talk about their still relatively new show at the time, along with the upcoming release of Braff's "Garden State." Lawrence talked about how the show was based in reality, partly because his best friend from the College of William & Mary -- where he went for undergrad -- was a future med school student named J.D. Hence the inspiration for Lawrence's group of normal, young, fun-loving friends trying to survive the rigors of becoming a doctor. Lawrence's last memory of J.D. was as a guy with an empty 12-pack of beer on his head. He told Fresh Air that his worst nightmare in the world as a young 23-year-old would have been to end up in the emergency room with J.D. as the doctor. At a talk at his alma mater in 2009, Lawrence said that


Prompt: Hong Kong-based digital currency exchange ANX has upgraded its iOS app with added functionality, after Apple recently relaxed its strict stance towards bitcoin-transmitting apps. The ‘ANX Vault’ app now includes the all-important send and receive functions vital to any bitcoin wallet. Although always available on the Android version, these features have only now appeared for iOS. ANX has also upgraded the Android version. Both Android and iOS editions of ANX Vault now feature the ability to send bitcoin via email to recipients who do not yet have bitcoin addresses. Security features Both versions of the app support optional three-factor authentication,

although, to still allow fast transactions, the app allows users to set daily spending limits that bypass the security feature. The exchange says that other security features include the ability to disable send privileges from a user’s desktop account in the event of a lost mobile device, OTP (one-time password) support for logging in and sending funds, and ‘industry standard’ encryption for all data communication. Multi-currency platform and sending Although based in Hong Kong, ANX aims for an international client base for both its full exchange and mobile apps. The platform supports the world’s most-traded fiat currencies (AUD, CAD, GBP, CHF, EUR, HKD, JPY, NZD, SGD and USD) and some of its most popular cryptocurrencies (BTC, DOGE, LTC, NMC, and PPC). Users set a home currency in which to view their total portfolio balance, and can view up-to-date exchange rates between cryptocurrency and fiat trading pairs. All cryptocurrency assets are viewable in a single comprehensive listing. BTC, LTC and DOGE can be sent to any other supported cryptocoin address with conversion performed by the exchange. The Android version also allows this feature for PPC and NMC. Standard features on any serious trading app are live updates and configurable price alerts, which ANX Vault also allows its users to set. The apps are available from their respective outlets: Apple’s iOS App Store and the Google Play Store. ANX exchanges Although founded in June 2013, ANX has quickly grown to have the world’s sixth-largest trade volume, thanks to its wide selection of currencies. In Hong Kong, where it is licensed as a Money Services Operator, the exchange manages a bitcoin ATM and physical shopfront-style trading point. The company recently launched a bitcoin debit card service, giving users another way to withdraw and spend their cryptocurrency wealth in a still fiat-dominated world. Its


Prompt: While the Berenstain Bears is ostensibly a mundane and inconsequential example of the Mandela Effect, there are other instances that are so uncanny, they’re hard to ignore. For example, when Darth Vader reveals his paternalistic relationship to Luke in Star Wars, most remember him saying, “Luke, I am your father.” In ‘reality,’ he says, “No, I am your father.” While an intransigent Star Wars fan might scoff at someone who misquotes such an important scene, it can’t be ignored that most people remember it in the former. Even James Earl Jones, who voiced Darth Vader, remembers the line incorrectly. Movie

quotes aside, an example of a famous real-life event that has been brought into the mystery of the Mandela Effect regards the famous protester at Tiananmen Square. The ‘Tank Man,’ whose defiant act of rebellion, standing in front of a tank with grocery bags in hand, is remembered by many as resulting in his death from being run over. In fact, he was not run over and there is no evidence of it, but many remember his crushing demise distinctly. This is nothing new to those familiar with the theory and there are many other examples that support it; so many that there is an entire subreddit devoted to the effect. With topics ranging from movies that never existed, to discrepancies in historical events, people vehemently claim to remember very particular things differently, but on a large, collective scale. Some people’s reactions are visceral when they experience new revelations due to the Mandela Effect, to the point of incurring panic attacks or questioning reality. MANDELA EFFECT THEORIES AND CERN One pragmatist theory for explaining the Mandela Effect is that it is simply a failure in collective memory. Our brains are very easily influenced by our own filters, as well as the perception of others. Many common instances of the Mandela Effect are trivial and maybe just went unnoticed in the past, or are the result of conclusions that our brains jump to based on the context of an image or video. But some are substantial, like an entire country hundreds of miles out of place. One of the more intriguing theories that attempts to explain this phenomenon points a finger at CERN and the large hadron collider in Switzerland. CERN’s experiments are intended to find illusory particles that could potentially show evidence of a multiverse, create tiny black holes or


Prompt: FRIDAY BUZZ COLUMN A six-pack of Dolphins notes: • With Miami not likely to land free agent Josh Norman, cornerback remains a high priority, though we hear a few other players also intrigue the Dolphins with their first-round pick if they fall to their range at No. 13. If the Dolphins rate a non-cornerback as the best player on their board when they're picking at No. 13, there's a belief they could still land a quality corner at 42 and/or 73, a prospect such as UM’s Artie Burns (if there at 42) or Baylor’s Xavien Howard or Virginia Tech's Kendall

Fuller or Samford's James Bradberry, among others. Drafting two corners is very much a possibility. Ohio State running back Ezekiel Elliott’s visit here Tuesday went very well, he would welcome the Dolphins drafting him if he slips to 13, and Miami has strong interest, according to someone involved. He already has a lease on an apartment in Miami, though that has nothing to do with any possibility of him landing with the Dolphins. Meanwhile, the Dolphins recently sent a contingent to Los Angeles to conduct a private workout with UCLA’s Myles Jack, the draft’s best linebacker. There’s Dolphins interest if he surprisingly slips out of the top 10. • What about UF’s 5-10 Vernon Hargreaves, who could be the best corner available at 13? Though he cannot be ruled out if he’s the best player available, I do know this: There is some resistance to Hargreaves among some Dolphins scouting/front office people who believe he’s undersized and see him more as a nickel back. Miami’s preference is a big, physical boundary corner. The Dolphins prefer bigger corners in general and are intrigued by Houston’s William Jackson and Ohio State’s Eli Apple, two 6-1 corners who visited. Jackson at No. 13 is certainly a possibility, but analysts disagree about whether Jackson is good value at 13. (Mel Kiper says he’s not.) Most pundits have Apple in the 20s or lower. One Dolphins official said trading down from 13 for a corner would be a consideration, if there's not a player at 13 that Miami covets in that range and if it believes one of the tall corners would be available later in the first round. • Besides Jack, Elliott and the corners, the Dolphins have closely studied a handful of first-round front-seven defenders, including Clemson defensive ends Kevin Dodd (visited, but


Prompt: July 21, 2009 Dennis Kosuth responds to a critique of his article on the 1989 Tiananmen uprising from a member of the Party for Socialism and Liberation. MY ARTICLE on the 1989 Tiananmen Square uprising in China ("Twenty years after Tiananmen Square") for SocialistWorker.org drew a harsh response from Richard Becker, writing for the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL). Including footnotes, Becker's reply is nearly twice as long as my original article. It is packed, every inch of the way, with denunciations of me and the International Socialist Organization, which publishes SocialistWorker.org. Why should a relatively brief article on

Tiananmen provoke such a lengthy and hostile response? It isn't because my article was a sustained attack on PSL--I mentioned the organization once, three paragraphs from the end. The answer is that what you think about the Tiananmen Square uprising goes to the heart of what you think about socialism. The American socialist Hal Draper once wrote a brilliant essay titled "The Two Souls of Socialism" that identifies two trends in the socialist movement historically--those who believe socialism can be imposed "from above," in the name of the working class, whether by electing socialists to government office or through a military victory and force of arms; and those who think socialism must be achieved "from below," by the collective action of the working-class majority in overturning capitalism and creating a workers' state based on mass democracy and freedom. The 1989 Tiananmen Square uprising shook China's rulers Becker and the PSL have two feet firmly planted in the "socialism from above" camp. Their identification of China with socialism depends, above all else, on the fact that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) remains in charge. To the PSL, the CCP is, ultimately, the embodiment of socialism, rather than anything to do with the Chinese working class. Therefore, at those points when the CCP bureaucracy was at odds with the mass of the Chinese working class, the PSL sides with the CCP--even when that means defending indefensible repression and violence by China's state machine. Ultimately, PSL's socialism from above drives people like Becker to ever greater--and ever more shrill--twists of logic and distortions of fact about Tiananmen Square. THIS IS clear from the beginning of Becker's response to my article, when he takes offense at my distaste for the Chinese National Anthem--a sign, he says, of my "cultural arrogance, jingoism and apparent ignorance."


Prompt: We're excited to announce that the latest Pixel Perfect Precision Handbook is available to download now (PDF, iBook). With over 40 pages of fresh content, as well as updates to what was already there, we've made the third generation of the handbook bigger, better, and more beautiful. So, what's new? Branding and Retina Images At first glance the most obvious change is our new branding — with bold typography and lively colours it's so much more us…two. We've also updated everything to Retina resolution, meaning even crisper detail in the imagery. Design and Development We're all too aware that some

projects get designed up front and then "thrown over the fence" to a development team, the two sides unaware of each other's existence for the most part — a classic waterfall way of working. Here at ustwo though, our developers are as much a part of a product's formation as the designers – accordingly, they are brought in right from the start and their input is desired throughout all phases of the project. This completely new chapter includes much of what we've learned in bridging this gap between the two disciplines, including advice on how to get both sides working together more effectively, plus design techniques to ease the transition from pixels to code. More Pixel Perfect Principles There are now more of the fundamental Pixel Perfect Principles, including Users, Motion, and Prototyping. More Accessibility We've added guidance on Error Prevention, particularly relevant to mobile due to the size restrictions placed on the input methods. Some of the content for this chapter has also been reorganised to fit together more logically: for example there is now a section on Copy, pulling in some previous advice from other sections and highlighting its vital role in usability. And of course, more Photoshop Since the last release of the handbook we've seen Adobe bring out their Creative Cloud update, which includes some major new features for interface designers: Live Shape Properties, Linked Smart Objects, and the super-useful Generator have all found a place in the latest handbook. Don't forget to follow @pppustwo for the latest design tips and tricks as well. Enjoy! One last thing… There's also now a Japanese version of PPP 2 available. The translation was handled by our friends over at Concent, and it looks fantastic — we're so pleased to see the content in another language, opening up the


Prompt: Breaking News Emails Get breaking news alerts and special reports. The news and stories that matter, delivered weekday mornings. July 13, 2016, 7:25 PM GMT / Updated July 13, 2016, 7:25 PM GMT By Linda Carroll Despite dire warnings about the dangers of synthetic cannabinoids, popularly known by names such as K2, Spice, Black Mamba and Kronic, they continue to grow in popularity. Just yesterday, 33 people were rushed to the hospital in Brooklyn, N.Y. with symptoms that suggested an overdose on the drugs, according to an NBC4 New York report. The city’s health department told the station that there

have been more than 6,000 K2-related emergency room visits and two confirmed deaths in New York City since 2015. In January, the American Association of Poison Control Centers listed 1,462 exposures. To get a better understanding of what K2 is and why the drug is so dangerous, NBC News spoke with Marilyn A. Huestis, a professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore and former chief of chemistry and drug metabolism at the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Q: What exactly is K2? A: These are synthetic compounds that bind to the same receptor in the body and brain as THC, the most psychoactive ingredient in [marijuana]. In fact, they can have really different structures from THC. The first synthetic cannabinoids were actually produced legitimately as tools for us to investigate the pharmacology of the endogenous cannabinoid system. This system is important for critical functions such as temperature control, hunger and reproduction. It also plays very important roles in the brain for executive function, which is what we use to take in information from the environment, evaluate it, and determine a course of action. The researchers who figured out how make these synthetics published their findings in scientific journals and illicit manufacturers learned from those articles. Q: So, if the drugs just mimic compounds that are not only found in marijuana, but are also naturally occurring in the body, what’s the problem? A: People are dying all the time from synthetic cannabinoids. They can be up to 100 times as potent as the THC in cannabis. Though this is a natural system in the body, marijuana or cannabinoids basically hijack the system and take over. Q: Just how dangerous are these compounds — can they actually kill you? We have learned that they can not only lead


Prompt: Former Home Secretary GK Pillai’s admission on Times Now - that an affidavit filed in the alleged “fake encounter” in Gujarat that killed four Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists, including Ishrat Jahan, was deliberately changed under political direction to omit mention of their LeT affiliation - has set the cat among the pigeons. Since this allegation has more or less been admitted by P Chidambaram in an interview to NDTV, it shows the extent to which the Gandhi family saw Narendra Modi as a clear threat to its political domination even as early as 2009 (or even earlier), when the Congress party

had just trounced the BJP in the general elections.Chidambaram told NDTV: “The original affidavit did say that A, B, C, D were terrorists, but the IB’s position was we don’t name or charge anyone as terrorists... therefore a second affidavit had to be filed to clarify (that),” and that he “owned the decision” to file the second affidavit. (Read here). What is shocking is not merely that the affidavit was changed, but it was changed in a way that made threats to national security secondary to the political interests of the Gandhi dynasty, Sonia and Rahul. Advertisement The change in the affidavit was wrong in principle for two reasons, even though it is fair to claim that details about the affiliation of those killed by the Gujarat police were not as important as the charge that they were killed in a “fake encounter”. First, who is being killed is not immaterial to how the fake encounter case is finally decided – especially if it leads to conviction. As an analogy, let’s assume a woman is being prosecuted for the murder of her husband. Is it immaterial to let the court know that she was beaten daily and that may be the cause that led to her murdering her husband, assuming it is all provable? Similarly, in a “fake encounter”, who was killed is not an insignificant fact. The court can show leniency even if there is a conviction if it was clear that the persons killed were threats to national security. Second, if Pillai is to be believed, there seems to have been wilful suppression of important national security aspects of the operation, Till the affidavit was changed, the Ishrat-LeT case was considered a successful Intelligence Bureau (IB) operation to lure and trap LeT terrorists, but this success was sacrificed


Prompt: Ready to fight back? Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week. You will receive occasional promotional offers for programs that support The Nation’s journalism. You can read our Privacy Policy here. Sign up for Take Action Now and get three actions in your inbox every week. Thank you for signing up. For more from The Nation, check out our latest issue Subscribe now for as little as $2 a month! Support Progressive Journalism The Nation is reader supported: Chip in $10 or more to help us continue to write about the issues

that matter. The Nation is reader supported: Chip in $10 or more to help us continue to write about the issues that matter. Fight Back! Sign up for Take Action Now and we’ll send you three meaningful actions you can take each week. You will receive occasional promotional offers for programs that support The Nation’s journalism. You can read our Privacy Policy here. Sign up for Take Action Now and we’ll send you three meaningful actions you can take each week. Thank you for signing up. For more from The Nation, check out our latest issue Travel With The Nation Be the first to hear about Nation Travels destinations, and explore the world with kindred spirits. Be the first to hear about Nation Travels destinations, and explore the world with kindred spirits. Sign up for our Wine Club today. Did you know you can support The Nation by drinking wine? Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution of the United States announces that “The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” Ad Policy The attorney general of the United States is a civil officer. If he has lied under oath to the Senate, that act demands impeachment. After news reports published last Wednesday made it clear that Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III had deceived the Senate regarding his interactions with Russian officials, there were immediate demands that the attorney general recuse himself from investigations into issues relating to those lies and that he resign as the nation’s chief law-enforcement officer. Sessions announced Thursday afternoon that he would recuse himself from any examination of Russian involvement with President Trump’s campaign. But he gave no indication that he would consider


Prompt: Solar For After Dark: How CSP Works October 31st, 2016 by Susan Kraemer Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) is the form of solar that can store the sun’s energy thermally for on-demand electricity generation at any time. CSP is clean energy, like solar PV or wind, but the back end or the power block works like any thermal energy power station (coal, natural gas, and nuclear power plants are thermal energy power stations). The difference is that instead of digging up a finite fuel from the earth, CSP harvests sunlight to make thermal energy. Because of its ability to store solar

energy thermally, CSP can be fully dispatchable. In other words, it can be switched on when needed — in the evening, before sunrise, or at whatever time the utility needs power. It can respond to new demand within the same day. The speed of start-up is limited only by the time it takes to start the turbines, about half an hour. How CSP Works In general, all CSP plants operate by aiming mirrors (heliostats) to reflect the sun’s light onto a receiver which then heats a fluid that ultimately generates thermal electricity like any other thermal power plant. That is where the similarities among the various types of CSP plants end. There are four types of CSP, with the oldest (Trough) being the most widespread, the newest (Tower) being the most likely to succeed, and two lagging technologies (Stirling Dish and Fresnel) that have yet to break more than a few megawatts of installed capacity. Why the Need for Storage Means Tower CSP is the Future Tower CSP is most likely to be the CSP of the future because it is the most economical technology to incorporate storage. And increasingly, storage is becoming a requirement of CSP. For utility-scale applications, the thermal storage possible with tower CSP is typically cheaper, more durable, and longer lasting than battery storage, rivaling the almost limitless recycling capability of pumped hydro. At grid scale, CSP thermal storage is cheaper than batteries, depending on how long the storage is — a half hour is better served by fast-acting batteries. Two tower CSP projects in Chile actually have both battery and thermal storage in order to combine the speedy reaction time of batteries with cheap long-term thermal storage. (Behind the meter, of course, the uncertainty of net metering makes battery storage sensible financially for solar homeowners


Prompt: Two administrators' wives among those traveling on the university's tab This Aug. 28, 2014, photo shows the Elliott Tower on the campus of Oakland University in Oakland County. An event is scheduled for Friday, Sept. 19, 2014, to dedicate the bell tower in the heart of campus. (Photo: Oakland University / AP) Oakland University spent $155,000 to fly board members, administrators and other staff to Florida in early February for a private board meeting and winter event for donors at a gulf coast resort, according to more than 700 pages of expense records obtained by the Detroit Free Press. Among

those flying down on the university's tab were the campus golf pro and the wives of the school's top two administrators. The money for the trip came from various general fund budgets. The general fund is largely made up of money from state aid and tuition. The trip came less than seven months after the Rochester school raised tuition by 8.4% for the current school year, the largest percentage hike in that time period among Michigan’s 15 public universities. The hike exceeded a state tuition cap and forced OU to give up some state aid, but officials said they needed the money to adequately fund increasing needs for professors and infrastructure at the growing school. In total, the university paid $88,000 for plane tickets, dining out and drinks and lodging for 42 university employees and board members to attend the two-day, private board retreat, followed by the annual two-day Winter College attended by 110 employees, donors and alumni. Officials spent another $62,000 on banquet rooms, conference rooms and catered meals at the resort. Among the expenses: $1,600 for airfare and food for the wives of President George Hynd and Chief Operating Officer Scott Kunselman, a former board member. $1,141, including $212 on liquor and wine, for a dinner attended by 13 people, including the school's provost and academic deans. Guests at the dinner dined on oysters, $44 Chilean sea bass and $40 scallops. A watch party for an OU men’s basketball game against Youngstown State, at which Athletic Director Jeff Konya bought $79 worth of alcohol, for which he was reimbursed. Konya has a special exemption from the university to purchase alcohol and be reimbursed. The board retreat and Winter College were held at the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort and Spa in Bonita Springs, Fla., a resort described on


Prompt: Hillary Clinton speaks at a campaign event in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Credit:AP Clinton's numbers are firming as Trump implodes. But in recent time, close to 70 per cent of Americans have marked her down as dishonest. She can't make too much of Trump's worst-ever favourable ratings as a presidential candidate, because hers are the second worst. We get plenty of frightening professional analysis on why Trump behaves as he does – Clinton gets less time on the analyst's couch. Though in 1996, there was quite a kerfuffle when William Safire, self-styled "libertarian conservative" columnist and one-time supporter of Bill Clinton, denounced

the then first lady in print as a "congenital liar" and an "habitual prevaricator" - to which her husband responded by saying that were he not the president, he'd have punched Safire on the nose. Despite being caught out repeatedly, Clinton is seen as consistently bending and breaking facts, whether it's about her past; about what she knew or didn't know about the 2012 Benghazi attack in which four Americans, including an ambassador, were killed; or about what she did or didn't do with the private email server stashed in her basement. Clinton was sensational in 2008, claiming to have landed in Bosnia as first lady "under sniper fire … with our heads down". No – the only welcome she received was from smiling schoolchildren waiting on the tarmac, eager to present Clinton with their poems. Donald Trump speaks during a coal mining roundtable in Virginia. Credit:AP At Politifact, the fact checkers were underwhelmed by her claims to have helped usher in peace in Northern Ireland; to have negotiated border opening for Kosovars fleeing into Macedonia; and to have stood up to the Chinese government on women's rights. Only one of her grandparents, not all four, were migrants to the US. No, she and Bill were not "dead broke" when they left the White House; and it's unlikely that she was named after Sir Edmund Hillary, because she was six years old when he climbed Everest. Biden on the presidential election campaign trail with Hillary Clinton in August last year Credit:AP For many the issue of the email server is a drag. But Clinton's conduct in the several investigations into her use of the server while serving as secretary of state is revealing. First, the State Department investigation revealed that what she publicly claimed was "allowed" had never been sanctioned;


Prompt: Abstract Neuroimaging evidence suggests that the parietal lobe has an important role in memory retrieval, yet neuropsychology is largely silent on this topic. Recently, we reported that unilateral parietal lobe damage impairs various forms of visual working memory when tested by old/new recognition. Here, we investigate whether parietal lobe working memory deficits are linked to problems at retrieval. We tested two patients with bilateral parietal lobe damage in a series of visual working memory tasks that probed recall and old/new recognition. Stimuli were presented sequentially and several stimulus categories were tested. The results of these experiments show that parietal lobe

damage disproportionately impairs old/new recognition as compared to cued recall across stimulus categories. The observed performance dissociation suggests that the posterior parietal lobe plays a particularly vital role in working memory retrieval. General Methods Participants Patients with bilateral parietal lobe damage are extremely rare. The survival rate after suffering the type of cerebrovascular event that produces bilateral parietal lobe damage is low. We were able to identify to patients with bilateral parietal lobe damage in our database. These patients have been discussed previously (Berryhill, Phuong, Picasso, Cabeza, & Olson, 2007); we summarize their profiles here. Patient EE555 is a 39-year-old former teacher with 16 years of education. Between April and June 2004, she suffered three infarcts in the watershed between the posterior and middle cerebral arteries. EE555’s MRI revealed symmetrical lesions in lateral aspects of the inferior parietal lobe, extending from superior aspects of the occipital lobe through the angular gyrus (Brodmann areas (BA) 39) in and around inferior and middle portions of the intraparietal sulcus (IPS). Damage did not encroach into the midline (e.g. precuneus). EE555’s lesions are depicted in . Open in a separate window EE555’s physical and perceptual symptoms are currently stable. Patient EE555’s primary deficit is simultanagnosia as defined by her inability to apprehend the contents of a visual scene, her abnormal performance on line cancellation tasks, in which she crosses off items only at the center, and her tendency towards local bias, as illustrated by her report of the local but not global elements in Navon letters. Language comprehension and speech fluency are unimpaired as assessed by her conversational skills, and performance on the auditory tests of the Western Aphasia Battery (Kertesz, 1982), which were uniformly at ceiling. Reading and writing are impaired due to her simultanagnosia and spatial disorientation. Her visual acuity is normal.


Prompt: Mossdeep City What have you done now? - It wasn’t me! It looks like an ancient seal has been broken. Trust me, I know a thing or two about ancient seals. - That other Archie is trying to wake up Kyogre. Then I suggest you do something about it, quickly. - You’re not going to help? I would but whenever I pass through the fog surrounding this island I am returned to Sinnoh. But you seem to be able to traverse the fog with impunity. - Yeah… I first thought Palkia and Dialga were involved but this feels… different. -

Gotta go! I rush to the pokémon center, while everyone is getting healed I consult the silver ball in my bag. I’ve got the next batch of backup for you. - I’m heading south to stop Archie. That’s not your mission! Go get the last badge and go to Ever Grande! - You weren’t here last time, you don’t know. I’m stopping Archie! I might know more than you think… Route 128 Riding on Susan’s back we surf as fast as Susan can. Soon enough we arrive at a shallow island, a place I recognise from before. We dive underwater, find a cavern and head inside. Seafloor Cavern I emerge near the submarine Archie had stolen, it seems abandoned. I continue deeper into the cavern. Why did I get stuck with guard duty? I wanted to see Kyogre. It sure is dark in here, I hope nobody sneaks up on me and knocks me out. I quietly sneak up behind the goon and with a swift blow to the head he’s out cold. I encounter a few other goons patrolling further inside but I give them the slip. Huh? What was that noise? Hmm… Hey who’s footprints are these? Oh, they’re mine… After shoving a few boulders out of my way I reach a large pool, Archie is standing on a ledge above it and Kyogre sleeps below. Maxie and other Maxie are already here but it doesn’t look like things went well for them. Damn! I thought for sure if both of us- Haharr! Ye both brought fire types to a water battle an’ thought ye stood a chance? And now th’ little scamp wants t’ try his luck! Go Mightyena! - Go Amber! - Earthquake! Scary face! Mightyena makes an unnerving look at Amber while she triggers an


Prompt: Diary of the damned: Never seen before, a lost diary of the Great War so brutally vivid you'll feel YOU are there in the trenches Harry Drinkwater joined a 'Pals Battalion' when the war began in 1914 He was sent to the front lines and suffered the grueling realities of war His diary entries, never before published, tell of his hellish existence caked in mud, deprived of sleep and endlessly confronted by the deaths of his friends Volunteer: Harry Drinkwater, pictured, recorded the horrors of the First World War in vivid diary entries After volunteering as an Army private following

the outbreak of World War I in 1914, former grammar-school boy Harry Drinkwater, 25, joined a ‘Pals battalion’ — so-called because the men were encouraged to join up with local friends and work colleagues. A few months later, his conversion from Stratford-upon-Avon shop assistant to soldier was complete. In this extract from his remarkable diary - which it was strictly against the rules to keep and which has been published for the first time - Harry writes about his brutal introduction to the trenches at the Somme in Picardie, Northern France... Thursday, December 16, 1915 Arrived in [the hamlet of] Suzanne today, after a very hard march. We’re billeted in tents, 12 men in each, encamped between the enemy and our own heavy guns. At night-time, one sees little slits of light shining from the tents on the puddles of water outside, which give the impression of a fairy land. Rolling into our blankets, we occasionally hear the ‘splash, splash’ as some fellow moves from one tent to another, or the plod of the sentry. Plus the continual shriek of shells. Tomorrow we go into the trenches. I wonder what sort of a show we will make. Sunday, December 19 No words can adequately describe the conditions. It’s not the Germans we’re fighting, but the weather. Within an hour of moving off, we were up to our knees in mud and water. The mud gradually got deeper as we advanced along the trench. We hadn’t gone far before we had to duck; the enemy were sending over their evening salute of shells. Pals battalion: Harry (centre left, marked in blue ink) joined the Second Birmingham Battalion alongside friends from home. Most of them died by the end of the war To move forward, I had to use both elbows for


Prompt: Trimethylaminuria ('fish odour syndrome') Trimethylaminuria (TMAU) is an uncommon condition that causes an unpleasant, fishy smell. It's also called "fish odour syndrome". Sometimes it's caused by faulty genes that a person inherits from their parents, but this isn't always the case. There's currently no cure, but there are things that can help. Symptoms of trimethylaminuria Trimethylaminuria symptoms can be present from birth, but they may not start until later in life, often around puberty. The only symptom is an unpleasant smell, typically of rotting fish – although it can be described as smelling like other things – that can affect

the: breath sweat pee vaginal fluids The smell may be constant or may come and go. Things that can make it worse include: sweating stress certain foods – such as fish, eggs and beans periods When to see a GP See a GP if you notice a strong, unpleasant smell that doesn't go away. They can check for more common causes, such as body odour, gum disease, a urinary tract infection or bacterial vaginosis. Tell your GP if you think it might be trimethylaminuria. It's an uncommon condition and they may not have heard of it. They may refer you to a specialist for tests to check for the condition. Causes of trimethylaminuria In trimethylaminuria, the body is unable to turn a strong-smelling chemical called trimethylamine – produced in the gut when bacteria break down certain foods – into a different chemical that doesn't smell. This means trimethylamine builds up in the body and gets into bodily fluids like sweat. In some cases, this is caused by a faulty gene a person has inherited from their parents. How trimethylaminuria is inherited Many people with trimethylaminuria inherit a faulty version of a gene called FMO3 from both their parents. This means they have 2 copies of the faulty gene. The parents themselves might only have 1 copy of the faulty gene. This is known as being a "carrier". They usually won't have symptoms, although some may have mild or temporary ones. If you have trimethylaminuria, any children you have will be carriers of the faulty gene so are unlikely to have problems. There's only a risk they could be born with the condition if your partner is a carrier. Genetic counselling may help you understand the risks of passing trimethylaminuria on to any children you have. Treatments for trimethylaminuria There's currently


Prompt: " " The AAP has realized that a " just turn it off" stance is not very realistic in the digital age. Thanasis Zovoilis/Getty The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is changing its mind about "screen time" – or at least bringing its stance into the full-blown digital age. The impending revision of the AAP's policy statement, announced in October, is driven by an acknowledgment that its current screen-time guidelines, best known for nixing any screen time for children under 2 and limiting older kids and teenagers to two hours a day, are outdated. Some of the current advice predates

widespread Internet use. "The problem is that technology moves faster than science can study it," says Dr. Ari Brown, a practicing pediatrician and chair of the AAP Children, Adolescents and Media Leadership Work Group, via email. "Our previous recommendations were made because we had enough health and developmental concerns about potential risk of TV use to advise parents about it." With schools eagerly implementing technology wherever funding allows, not to mention grade-school enrichment classes on coding, software that lets kids compose music on computers and strong anecdotal evidence that playing Minecraft can benefit kids with autism, espousing strict minimization ignores the obvious. Today's kids are "digital natives." Technology is in their blood. The AAP's new view, summarized in "Beyond 'turn it off': How to advise families on media use," sees TVs, computers, gaming systems, smartphones and tablets as mere tools. Time spent with them can be good for kids or bad for kids, depending on how they're used. The AAP made addressing children and media a top priority starting in 2012, a focus that culminated in the May 2015 "Growing Up Digital" symposium. The conference brought together experts on child development, social science, pediatrics, media, neuroscience and education, and called attention to the growing body of evidence supporting the potential (and potentially significant) benefits of screen time in child and adolescent development. At the symposium, social scientists presented data showing that when teens connect online, those peer connections can be "significantly meaningful," and sometimes "more supportive than their real life friendships," reports Brown. The implication, she says, is that "there are some very positive [online] opportunities for acceptance and support as teens develop their identity and self-esteem." Other insights pointed to possible ways to strengthen digital media's teaching potential. Neuroscientists, she says, presented research showing that 2-year-olds learn novel words


Prompt: Last month, the Seattle Parks Department ordered the destruction of a play area designed for special needs kids, claiming its four-foot rope ladder, tire swing, and "nest" made of rope and bike tires were "extreme dangers" and "hazardous conditions." That's an odd verdict: In 10 years of existence, no children were ever significantly injured on the play area equipment, according to Liz Bullard, who helped design the space. As she writes in Crosscut.com: These simple play features may seem ordinary, but...here children with cerebral palsy, autism and developmental delays are encouraged and assisted as needed to climb and swing alongside

their typically developing peers. The joy is palpable. We complied with the order, but it has left a bitter taste in our mouths. Our kids have been robbed of the simple pleasure of climbing and swinging under a beautiful tree. The thing about kids with special needs is that they often have to spend a lot of time in less-than-fun institutions. Hospitals. Therapists' offices. Waiting rooms. The "Wild Zone," as the play area was called, was specifically "designed to provide relief from the highly controlled and often hyper-medicalized world our kids move in," writes Bullard. One mom of a child with special needs commented on a post about the city's order, "This is a travesty!! How dare they steal the only play space in the Greater Seattle area, let alone the NW that is dedicated to creating a healthy play space for special kids where they aren't judged by their lesser abilities." Wrote another mom: "The Play Garden is the best! My son attended preschool there for three years and I am so grateful for the Wild Zone. There was nothing dangerous about it. Nothing!" Ah, but when you're a bureaucrat and you live in the world of what if thinking, danger is everywhere. Just imagine, "what if someone got hurt?" Look at the world that way and no play area wil seem safe enough. This outlook seems to be sweeping Washington state. Recall that just a few weeks ago the Richland School District decided to phase out all swings because what if a child got hurt on them? Too bad the bureaucrats never consider the reverse: What if kids never get a chance to climb a ladder, or hang from the monkey bars? What if kids with special needs know that after their doctor's appointment they will have to


Prompt: That’s a massive amount of money and speaks to both the complexity of the U.S. corporate tax code and the extreme lengths companies will go to lower their tax bill. Apple, for instance, uses a subsidiary known as Apple Operations International (AOI) to hold most of its offshore profits, as a report from the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations explained last year. AOI is incorporated in Ireland, where the corporate tax rate is just 2 percent. Because of that, AOI avoids paying the U.S. corporate tax rate of 35 percent. But the Irish corporate tax code only applies to companies

whose management and control reside in Ireland. It has nothing to do with where the entity is incorporated. Therefore, AOI’s management and control is not located in Ireland, so it avoids the Irish corporate tax as well. The Citizens for Tax Justice report shows that Ireland is the seventh most popular tax haven for Fortune 500 companies. You’ll see some other familiar names on the list: the Netherlands, the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and Switzerland. The 362 companies have nearly $2 trillion combined sitting overseas. Including Fortune 500 firms without subsidiaries in tax haven jurisdictions and non-Fortune 500 companies brings that to over $2 trillion. That money cannot be used to pay wages or invest in the United States. Companies cannot buy back shares or issue dividends with it. Apple even issued $17 billion in debt last year for dividend and buyback programs to avoid repatriating their overseas profits and paying the 35 percent corporate rate. This money could have provided a huge boost to the U.S. economy if companies had returned it to the United States. Instead, it sits overseas, collecting dust. While it’s easy to denigrate the multinational firms for keeping the profits abroad, the corporate tax code also deserves blame. Democrats and Republicans both agree it needs to be reformed. The 35 percent rate is the highest in the developed world. The corporate tax code contains so many tax breaks that no rational company pays that rate. Instead, they hire teams of lawyers and use complicated tax strategies to lower their tax bill in any way they can. This complex system inherently favors those with the resources to hire teams of lawyers: big, rich companies. New, small firms are at a significant disadvantage. The corporate tax code isn’t even doing a good job collecting revenue for the federal


Prompt: FILE - In this July 10, 2012 file photo, Suzanne Meredith, of Walpole, Mass., gases up her car at a Gulf station in Brookline, Mass. Reducing sulfur in gasoline and tightening emissions standards on cars beginning in 2017, as the Obama administration is proposing, would come with costs as well as rewards. (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File) WASHINGTON (AP) — Reducing sulfur in gasoline and tightening emissions standards on cars beginning in 2017, as the Obama administration is proposing, would come with costs as well as rewards. The cost at the pump for cleaner air across the country could be less

than a penny or as high as 9 cents a gallon, depending on who is providing the estimate. An oil industry study says the proposed rule being unveiled Friday by the administration could increase gasoline prices by 6 cents to 9 cents a gallon. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates an increase of less than a penny and an additional $130 to the cost of a vehicle in 2025. The EPA is quick to add that the change aimed at cleaning up gasoline and automobile emissions would yield billions of dollars in health benefits by 2030 by slashing smog- and soot-forming pollution. Still, the oil industry, Republicans and some Democrats have pressed the EPA to delay the rule, citing higher costs. Environmentalists hailed the proposal as potentially the most significant in President Barack Obama's second term. The so-called Tier 3 standards would reduce sulfur in gasoline by more than 60 percent and reduce nitrogen oxides by 80 percent, by expanding across the country a standard already in place in California. For states, the regulation would make it easier to comply with health-based standards for the main ingredient in smog and soot. For automakers, the regulation allows them to sell the same autos in all 50 states. The Obama administration already has moved to clean up motor vehicles by adopting rules that will double fuel efficiency and putting in place the first standards to reduce the pollution from cars and trucks blamed for global warming. "We know of no other air pollution control strategy that can achieve such substantial, cost-effective and immediate emission reductions," said Bill Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies. Becker said the rule would reduce pollution equal to taking 33 million cars off the road. But the head of American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers,


Prompt: A cash-strapped elementary school in Lakeland, FL, has turned to the local church to help out. Steve Comparato, the principal of Combee Elementary School, worried at how he was going to provide essential supplies for his students when his budget was cut by a third this year, was delighted when the First Baptist Church at the Mall “adopted” his school. The result? The church filled the school’s resource room with $5000 worth of supplies; it also catered spaghetti dinners at evening school events, bought sneakers for needy kids, and provided math and English tutors. And in exchange? “We have inroads

into public schools that we had not had before,” says Pastor Dave McClamma. “By befriending the students, we have the opportunity to visit homes to talk to parents about Jesus Christ.” McClamma added, “At Christmas, the school connected the church with parents who said they wouldn’t mind being visited at home by First Baptist. The church brought gifts, food, and the gospel. Of about 30 families visited over two weekends in December, thirteen ‘came to the Lord.’” Also according to McClamma, adopting Combee goes far beyond providing resources like school supplies. “The purpose is to show them the church cares, and that there is hope, and hope is found in Jesus Christ.” “If they want to come in and help, who am I to say no?” asks Steve Comparato, the principal. As I wrote here last week, there is a budget crisis in education going on right now. Public schools around the nation are desperate to come up with innovative ways to make money: the San Diego Unified School District is considering plastering its middle- and high-school gyms with corporate advertising, and thus bring in $30,000 to $50,000 a year per school; Manatee County, FL, just received a $20,000 check from a local cucumber grower with the idea of sponsoring and naming an elementary school engineering program; bake sales just don’t cut it anymore. These may be pacts with the devil, but what about a pact with Jesus? There are plenty of people of faith who help those in need because they care about them deeply. There is no problem with churches, or any other faith-based groups, offering to help by donating funds or supplies, as long as that is all they are doing. But I believe that if religious groups only give that help with the intention of having


Prompt: Son of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker Speaks Out Against NC Marriage Amendment Email Print Whatsapp Menu Whatsapp Google Reddit Digg Stumbleupon Linkedin Jay Bakker grew up in North Carolina in the limelight of his parents' Praise The Lord ministry before it crumbled in the 1980s after his father pled guilty to fraud charges. Now the young minister is opposing the state's efforts to pass a marriage amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman. The tattooed-laden Bakker, 36, now lives in New York City and is the co-founder of Revolution Church, which meets on Sundays in Pete's

Candy store, a bar. He was featured in a 2006 documentary "One Punk Under God." Since he is no longer a resident of North Carolina, he cannot vote on the issue but still felt moved to join the efforts opposing it. On Sunday, Bakker led some 75 people in a rally against the marriage amendment. "I ignored all these amendments being passed and passed until it hit my hometown and I was like…When I heard about it, I called down here and offered to help," Bakker told WNCT News. North Carolina is one of three states where voters will decide how to define marriage. The May 8 election is generating substantial attention on both sides of the issue, but recent polls show that a majority of North Carolinians are expected to cast their ballots in favor of the amendment. A Public Policy Polling survey of 1,191 likely voters conducted in late March showed voters favored the amendment 58 to 38 percent. A similar poll conducted by SurveyUSA showed almost the same numbers. "My parents taught me to love people across the board and always be open to people," said Bakker. "They were always into equality and reaching out to the marginalized and things like that." The debate surrounding the amendment has become so heated that it has sparked vandalism against some churches that are speaking out in support of the issue. A sign in front of Tabernacle Baptist Church in Hickory, N.C. that reads "Marriage Sunday April 22" was vandalized late last week when someone painted over the sign, "Hate Speech Sunday April 22." "Well I just believe what the Lord says about the marriage amendment," church member Greg Sullins told the Hickory Daily Record. "We don't hate people – we love them. But we serve a loving God who


Prompt: Tiny "walking" proteins could be used to investigate mechanical deformations in soft materials according to Hokkaido University researchers. The researchers employed a concept that is a part of the transportation network in cells. "Walking" filament-shaped proteins, such as kinesin, carry cargo on one of their ends while two foot-shaped structures on the other end move one "foot" in front of the other along a network of associated protein microtubules in the cells. The team aimed to test whether these walking proteins and their associated proteins could be used as a sensor for stretching and compressing a soft silicon-based material polydimethylsiloxane

(PDMS) that is used, for example, in manufacturing contact lenses. First, they deposited kinesin motor proteins on the surface of the PDMS so that one end of the kinesin proteins was attached to the PDMS, while the other end remained free. Next, the team deposited fluorescent-microtubules on the kinesin-layered surface. The layered PDMS was then placed in a special stretch chamber that was observed under the microscope. When the team neither stretched nor compressed the PDMS, the microtubules moved randomly on the PDMS surface at a constant velocity. This movement effectively happens due to the kinesin proteins "walking in place" because they are attached to the surface of the PDMS. But as they move their "feet" along the free microtubules, the microtubules are forced to move around randomly on the material's surface. When the team stretched the PDMS, the microtubules moved faster and aligned themselves parallel to the stretching axis. The density of kinesin proteins on the surface also decreased as a result of the stretching. When the PDMS were compressed, however, the microtubules slowed down and aligned themselves perpendicular to the compression axis, while the density of kinesin proteins on the surface of the material increased. The team also tested the use of the microtubules as "probes" to detect the mechanical deformation of another soft material, polyurethane, a material commonly used in the manufacture of artificial skin and heart valves, and came up with similar results. "Although further research is still required to prevent the denaturation of the proteins which occurs during the experiment, our present work should facilitate the elucidation of the surface science of soft materials in the future," the researchers say in their study published in the journal Nature Communications. Akira Kakugo, the lead author of the paper, further explains: "since deforming soft materials provides environments


Prompt: The Sihuanaba, La Siguanaba, Cigua or Cegua is a supernatural character from Central American folklore. It is a shape-changing spirit that typically takes the form of an attractive, long haired woman seen from behind. She lures men away into danger before revealing her face to be that of a horse or, alternatively, a skull. The Siguanaba and its variants may have been brought to Latin America from Spain during the Colonial Period, used by the colonists as a means of exercising control over the indigenous and mestizo population.[1] Appearance [ edit ] When encountered, she is a beautiful woman who

is either naked or dressed in flimsy white; she usually appears bathing in a public water tank, river, or other water source,[2] although she may also be found washing clothing.[3] She likes to lure lone men out late on dark, moonless nights, without letting them see her face at first.[4] She tempts such men away from their planned routes to lose them in deep canyons.[4] In Guatemala, the Siguanaba appears as a beautiful, seductive woman with very long hair. She will not reveal her face until the last moment, when it is revealed as either the face of a horse or, alternatively, a human skull.[5] If her victim (usually an unfaithful man) does not die of fear then he is driven mad by the sight.[6] From afar the Siguanaba can imitate the appearance of a man's girlfriend in order to lead him astray.[6] When appearing to children, the Siguanaba will take on the appearance of the child's mother in order to lure her victim into her grasp; once touched by the Siguanaba the child is driven mad and she will lead her victim into the wilderness to leave the child lost and insane.[7] Defence [ edit ] Traditional methods are said to ward off the Siguanaba. In the border regions between Guatemala and El Salvador, those who see the Siguanaba make the sign of the cross upon her or bite their machete, while simultaneously banishing both the evil spirit and the fear that grips the victim.[8] Etymology [ edit ] The word siguanaba or sihuanaba has its origin in the indigenous languages of Mesoamerica. Various words have been suggested as its source. In parts of Mexico the Siguanaba is known as macihuatli, a Nahuatl word that can be broken down to two elements; cihuatl (meaning "woman") and matlatl (meaning "net").


Prompt: "Cinder block" redirects here. For the American singer, see Cinder Block (musician) "Breezeblocks" redirects here. For the song by Alt+J, see Breezeblocks (song) An interior wall of painted CMUs A concrete masonry unit (CMU) is a standard size rectangular block used in building construction. CMUs are some of the most versatile building products available because of the wide variety of appearances that can be achieved using concrete masonry units.[1] Those that use cinders (fly ash or bottom ash) are called cinder blocks in the United States, breeze blocks (breeze is a synonym of ash)[2] in the United Kingdom, and hollow

blocks in the Philippines. In New Zealand and Canada they are known as concrete blocks (a name common in the United States also). In New Zealand, they are also called construction blocks. In Australia they are also called Besser blocks and Besser bricks, because the Besser Company was a major supplier of machines that made concrete blocks. Clinker blocks use clinker as aggregate. In non-technical usage, the terms cinder block and breeze block are often generalized to cover all of these varieties. Composition [ edit ] Concrete blocks are made from cast concrete (e.g. Portland cement and aggregate, usually sand and fine gravel, for high-density blocks). Lower density blocks may use industrial wastes, such as fly ash or bottom ash,[3][4] as an aggregate.[5] Recycled materials, such as post-consumer glass, slag cement, or recycled aggregate, are often used in the composition of the blocks.[6] Use of recycled materials within blocks can create different appearances in the block, such as a terrazzo finish, and may help the finished structure earn LEED certification. Lightweight blocks can also be produced using autoclaved aerated concrete. Sizes and structure [ edit ] The use of blockwork allows structures to be built in the traditional masonry style with layers (or courses) of staggered blocks. Concrete blocks may be produced with hollow centers (cores) to reduce weight or improve insulation. Blocks come in modular sizes, with the most popular typically referred to (by their thickness) as "4-inch", "6-inch", "8-inch", and "12-inch". In the US, CMU blocks are nominally 16 in (410 mm) wide and 8 in (200 mm) long. Their actual dimensions are their nominal dimensions, minus ⅜ in any direction (to allow for mortar joints regardless of their orientation as laid).[7] In Ireland and the UK, blocks are usually 440 mm × 215 mm × 100 mm


Prompt: [tor-relays] Towards a Tor Node Best Best Practices Document It's occurred to me that we have yet to provide any official recommendations with respect to best practices for operating Tor relays. This post is my attempt to define a reasonable threat model and use it to develop some recommendations. My plan is to post it here first, to subject it to review by the relay operator community. After operators have a chance to comment, the plan is to relocate the document to the Tor Wiki and/or a blog post. As always, to focus our thoughts, we start with the adversary's

goals. Adversary Goals There is a significant difference between adversaries that can see inside of router-to-router TLS vs those that cannot. I believe this capability distinction governs the adversary goals in terms of compromising relays as opposed to merely externally observing them. Adversaries that can unwrap router TLS can perform every attack that an actual node can perform, at any location between the user and the node, and/or between the node and other nodes. In particular, adversaries that can see inside router TLS can perform tagging attacks (see https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor-dev/2012-March/003361.html) as well as perform circuit-specific active and passive timing analysis. These attacks can be quite severe. An adversary that is able to obtain Guard identity keys is free to perform a tagging attack anywhere on the Internet. In other words, if the adversary is interested in monitoring a particular user, the adversary need only obtain the identity keys for that user's 3 guard nodes, and from that point on, the adversary will be able to transparently monitor everything that user does by way of using tagging to bias the users paths to connect only to surveilled exit nodes who also have had their identity keys compromised. Based on this distinction, it seems that some simple best practices can increase the costs of an adversary that wishes to compromise tor traffic. Let's now consider how the adversary goes about compromising router TLS. Attack Vectors There are two high-level vectors towards seeing inside node-to-node TLS (which uses ephemeral keys that are rotated daily and authenticated via the node's identity key). Both high-level vectors therefore revolve around node identity key theft. Attack Vector #1: One-Time Key Theft The one-time adversary is interested in performing a grab of keys and then operating transparently upstream afterwords. This adversary will take the form of a coercive request


Prompt: For much of his life, former South Carolina defensive back Andre Goodman had a purpose to blanket wide receivers and make tackles and interceptions. Now the 10-year NFL veteran, who will be introduced as part of the 2015 SEC Football Legends Class in December, has a different purpose as the Gamecocks' Director of Football Student-Athlete Development. "My job has a lot to do with grooming players for life after football and helping them transition from high school to college, and then from college to the real world," Goodman said. "We talk a lot about career development, job placement, time management

and balancing your personal life with school, academics and your profession. We want the (student-athletes) to maintain that sense of balance once they leave the playing arena and enter into the real world." Goodman played cornerback for South Carolina from 1998-2001. He earned second-team All-SEC honors by the league's coaches as a senior and was named to the SEC Academic Honor Roll during his career. He was selected in the third round of the 2002 NFL draft by the Detroit Lions, and also played with the Miami Dolphins and Denver Broncos during his decade in the NFL. Now in his fourth year on the job with his alma mater, Goodman knows that a professional playing career is short, and that most student-athletes won't be playing professional football. "Managing expectations and helping student-athletes remain realistic is key," Goodman said. "It is tough, even if they do make it to the pros. They have to be realistic because it's a violent sport, and it doesn't take much to go from playing to not playing in the matter of just one play. Helping them become realistic is the toughest challenge, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I'm not here to kill their dreams. I'm here to give them tools and resources to help them transition." As he focuses on off-the-field activities of the student-athletes and serving as an important resource in balancing the demands of academics, athletics, community outreach, and their personal lives in their transition in and out of college athletics, Goodman noted that one of the most important factors for being successful in his role is trust. "When they can actually sit down and have a conversation outside the game of football that they normally wouldn't have with someone else, it means a lot," Goodman said. "It can be


Prompt: The objective Make a black box, a device which would record short clips from camera in loop overwriting oldest clips. That would produce constant stream of short movies which put together would make one long recording containing last 30minutes (or more – depending on storage capacity) of my riding. Among with the recording, telemetric data would be collected such as velocity, RPM, temperature, front and rear brake pressed, depressed, and turn signals, and maybe more. Then this data could be put on the video in overlay. The motorcycle Yamaha XJ6SA 2010. Identify by what means communication between the ECU and

the dashboard is performed. Which cables are used and what is the protocol used? After inspecting the service manual for my bike I was able to eliminate wires which are used for other things (see picture), and I left with only one, which is connecting the dash, the ECU and the immobilizer. Other ones was for flashing some warning LEDs, gathering information from fuel pump, oil switch and so on. So the yellow-blue wire was my first guess and it was correct. On the ecuhacking forum, which was source of very helpful information, guys was talking about something called K-line. I believe it is something widely common in the automotive industry, and for certain it has bunch of ISO standards describing it, but hey, if this is only one wire, and data flowing inside is some kind of serial communication, I bet I could sniff it, and figure out without any standards, which are hard to find and get (there is so much of them, I’ve got confused after few minutes of googling). Figure out how to interface this, make some circuit if needed. Again on the ecuhacing forum I’ve found information that K-line has logic levels relative to 12V, where 0V is logic 0, and 12V logic 1. There has to be some voltage level converter if I want to connect some TTL stuff to it. On the forum some guys were using a L9637 chip which is described as “ISO 9141 INTERFACE” by its datasheet. So I bought a few of these and connected it as follows : Later on I removed the 510 ohm pull up resistor, because after turning engine on there was error showing of on the dash. I guessed that could be this resistor, and it helped. Dunno what was wrong. Most difficult part


Prompt: NBN, British Telecom and turning back the clock NBN boss Bill Morrow recently highlighted that the company formerly known as NBN Co has instigated an information sharing scheme with UK’s biggest telco British Telecom (BT). It’s an informal agreement and while Morrow says it’s all a friendly exchange of knowledge to bolster NBN’s understanding of efficient network rollout and learning from BT’s extraordinarily high rate of fibre to the node (FTTN) deployment, is the path forged by BT really worth following? Despite its achievements BT’s performance can only be described as second-rate. Between 2005 and 2010 the telco spent about

$20 billion on the 21st Century Network project that upgraded the core network and subsequently led to the commencement of an approximately $15 billion FTTN/VDSL2 rollout around 2010 that lasted until late 2014. BT is now rolling out “fast, fibre optic broadband to homes and businesses in the UK” and it is difficult to find any mention of anything other than fibre optics and all-fibre access networks on BT’s website. BT’s move to a focus on an all-fibre access network is unsurprising when you consider what BT has achieved after expending about $35 billion or roughly $10 billion less than what NBN is likely to spend on the Coalition’s multi-technology mix (MTM) National Broadband Network. The 2014 Ofcom report (PDF) into UK fixed-line broadband performance states that the average UK residential fixed-line broadband speed was 22.8 Mbps at November 2014. What this means is that after spending about $35 billion (excluding OPEX over the period) the average UK residence has a broadband connection speed of less than 25/3 Mbps which is the US FCC’s latest definition of broadband. Second-rate multi-technology mix Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has on many occasions highlighted BT’s multi-technology mix broadband network as something that Australia should aspire to have. Yet industry analysts have pointed out time and again that BT’s broadband network would not provide the UK with anything other than a ten year stop gap network that would be obsolete before it was finished. That scenario has subsequently come to pass, with BT now reacting to competition from all-fibre network providers by refocusing on providing all-fibre network solutions. In 2012 the former BT chief technology officer Peter Cochrane slammed BT’s decision to rollout FTTN/VDSL2 describing it as “one of the biggest mistakes humanity has made” and “imposes huge unreliability risks”. And BT has been building


Prompt: I would have never, ever expected to be able to write a The Next Web blog post that involves my local library, but this story is just too crazy to not bring to your attention. It’s not really related to tech, though, so bear with me. People with a healthy interest in fundamental freedoms and basic human rights have probably heard about SABAM, the Belgian collecting society for music royalties, which has become one of the global poster children for how outrageously out of touch with reality certain rightsholders groups appear to be. In the past, SABAM has sought to

require Internet and hosting service providers to install filters that would prevent the illegal downloading of files. They lost that battle. Then, they wanted social networking companies to install monitoring, filtering or blocking systems to prevent illegal trading of digital music and other copyrighted material. They lost that battle. Don’t expect those setbacks to make them back down in their quest to display a stunning amount of stupidity to the world, though. If you questioned the sanity of the folks over at SABAM before, now I hope you’ll realize just how plain evil they really are. This morning, word got out in Belgian media that SABAM is spending time and resources to contact local libraries across the nation, warning them that they will start charging fees because the libraries engage volunteers to read books to kids. Volunteers. Who – again – READ BOOKS TO KIDS. Don’t bother looking at the date: it’s not April Fools Day just yet. Newspaper De Morgen reported this morning that the local library in Dilbeek (my hometown), as well as a handful of other libraries across Belgium, have already been contacted by SABAM about the ridiculous claim. Twice a month, the library in Dilbeek welcomes about 10 children to introduce them to the magical world of books. A representative of the library in question is quoted in the De Morgen report as saying there’s no budget to compensate people who read to the kids, relying instead on volunteers (bless them). Obligatory feel-good photo of children reading a book – story continues below. SABAM got in touch with the library to let them know that it thinks this is unacceptable, however, and that they should start coughing up cash for the audacity to read stories from copyrighted books out loud. The library rep calculates that it


Prompt: 12 May 2015 It happens to everyone. You get to the point where you have collected so much stuff in your “no longer use/need” pile that you decide it’s time to high tail it all outta there. You start to go through your items to decide what you may want to sell, what is just plain trash and what to donate. But there is another category that is often overlooked and that is “what is recyclable.” Below are 5 things in your junk pile that are recyclable instead of dump worthy. 5 Things in Your Junk Pile that are Recyclable

1. Glass Glass may seem like an obvious one, but many times people don’t pay attention how many items made out of the glass they actually have and then if it’s something that is old or cracked/chipped/broken they know it can’t be sold or donated so they decide to simply toss it. But instead, remember items such as vases, glass from picture frames, saved wine bottles or drink ware should be recycled instead! 2. Electronics There are centers that will recycle any kind of electronics or appliances – even curling irons! Here at Fire Dawgs we have relationships with centers like these and will happily take your items to be recycled by them. Computers and even your old, half broken holiday lights will be taken and recycled! 3. Mattresses Mattresses are practically impossible to resell for obvious hygienic reasons and so many people are left wondering what to do with after their lifespan is done. While it may seem that a mattress contains too many different materials to be recycled, there are centers that have special saws to dismember your mattress and separate the wood, metal, foam and cloth to be recycled. 4. Trophies But why would you ever get rid of your 3rd place trophy for 5th grade basketball? While trophies and medals are cool as a kid, most people don’t showcase them around the house once they are older and so instead they end up in a box somewhere for decade after decade. So instead of taking up storage space – or landfill space – be happy to know that they instead can be recycled! Centers break them down by melting them and or reusing them for new trophies. 5. Carpet & Rugs Stains, rips, pet hair – doesn’t matter! Recycling centers will happily take your old carpet


Prompt: ‘Dragon Ball Super’ episode 77 preview trailer, spoilers: The universe’s greatest martial arts tournament begins (Photo : Twitter/Kanzenshuu) Exciting times ahead as the New Type summaries, air dates and titles for "Dragon Ball Super" episodes 74 through 77 have been released. Warning: This article contains spoilers from the upcoming "Dragon Ball Super" episodes. Read to know more. The new scans have been released and Herms98 have translated the summaries and airdates for the upcoming episodes of the anime series. Advertisement "Dragon Ball Super" Episode 74 Synopsis, Title and Air date This episode is titled "For the Sake of Those He

Loves! The Indomitable Great Saiyaman" and it is scheduled to air on Sunday, Jan. 15 on Fuji TV at 9 a.m. Japan time. "Gohan's superhero identity "Great Saiyaman" is being made into a movie. Gohan is hired as the stunt double for Barry Karn, the mean-spirited star playing Great Saiyaman. While Gohan struggles with the film, the parasitic alien Watagash is up to no good on Earth. Watagash is lured by the darkness in people's hearts and infects them; the eviler they are, the more he increases their power," reads the synopsis. "Dragon Ball Super" Episode 75 Spoilers and Air date The title of this episode has not been revealed in the recently released spoilers. However, "Dragon Ball Super" episode 75 is expected to air on Jan. 22. "Goku is bored without a training partner, so Chi Chi calls Gohan, who turns into Great Saiyaman and takes Goku on but..." reads the synopsis. "Dragon Ball Super" Episode 76 Spoilers and Air date Episode 76 is scheduled to hit the airwaves on Sunday, Jan. 29, and the title is yet to be released. "Kuririn is picked next as the bored Goku's training partner. He suggests they train together under the Turtle Hermit like the old times. As a part of their training, the Turtle Hermit orders them to go get the "Paradise Grass" herb from a forest. In the forest, they find Freeza, Majin Boo, Cell, and other old foes Goku and co. have fought," reads the translated synopsis. "Dragon Ball Super" Episode 77 Spoilers and Air date The title for episode 77 of "Dragon Ball Super" is not yet out, but we know that the episode will air on Feb. 5. "When Goku goes to Bulma's house to train with Whis, he finds her belly has gotten big, and he


Prompt: This year, I started out with a goal of running a marathon (half, full, ultra and everything in between) every month. The first part of the year was more focused on bumping the miles so I could run the Big Basin 50K. The later part of the year was sustaining that with as many 50K’s or marathons as my schedule would allow. I’m a happy-go-lucky mid-pack runner, though every now and then I finish in the top 10%. Running a marathon, I used to think was all legs and there’s some truth to it. But I think it’s more than

that. Running a Marathon I’ll categorize my runs in four ways. First is the explorative, like when I’m doing a route as part of the Bay Area Trail Running series. This involves charting a route, using Strava to map it out, taking pictures along the way, etc. Second is for fun, which is simply getting out on a trail or going for a run with friends with no pace, time target or training in mind. Third is intervals, which are short focused fast runs as I describe in three ways to increase running stamina. And that brings me to the fourth one, racing. Once you build up your endurance to run 15 to 20 miles at a comfortable pace, I think two things happen. First your body is obviously conditioned to take on that distance. Second and an important one at that, is you become very aware of the needs of your body. When to push it, when to back off, what and when to eat/drink, what to carry, etc. And this is a never ending learning process that has nothing to do with just your legs. My wife calls it PRS (pre-race stress), but I do tend to get a little too obsessive before a race. I have a Nathan 20oz hand-held, an Amphipod waist and an SJ Ultra Vest and the choice of what I carry really depends on the elevation profile, location of the aid stations and the weather on the day of the race. Lately, I’ve become very picky about going as light as I can and getting away with it. If I’m running a marathon organized by Inside Trail Racing, for example, I don’t have to carry any Clif Shot Gels or Succeed S Caps, since I know they have ’em at the aid station.


Prompt: Sheffield United Football Club announces today (Tuesday) that HRH Prince Abdullah bin Mosaad bin Abdulaziz Al Saud has become joint owner of the Club. Click here to download an Arabic version of this announcement. Prince Abdullah has secured a 50% interest in Blades Leisure Ltd, the holding company for Sheffield United FC, in return for which he will invest substantial new capital into the club with the aim of working with current owner Kevin McCabe and his family to achieve the Blades' return to the Premier League as quickly as possible. The Prince becomes Co-Chairman with Kevin McCabe of Blades

Leisure and Sheffield United. Prince Abdullah, aged 47, is a grandson of the founder of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, King Abdulaziz. He is a passionate football supporter and is former President of Al Hilal FC, the largest and most successful club in Saudi Arabia. He is also Chairman of Saudi Arabia's Football Privatisation Committee. Prince Abdullah is a prominent Saudi businessman and industrialist. He is the founder and Chairman of the publicly-listed Saudi Paper Manufacturing Group, the largest paper tissue manufacturer in the Middle East. He is active in other fields in the services and investments sectors in Saudi Arabia, and internationally. He travels extensively and works with other prominent businessmen from around the world to promote trade, goodwill and understanding through sport between Saudi Arabia and other countries. Prince Abdullah said: "I am delighted to invest in such a sensibly-organised, family and community club with a great history and heritage. Joining Sheffield United FC at a time close to its 125th year in existence is significant to me and, like Kevin, I am determined to see it achieve its goals and look forward to working with the whole Blades community. However, money will be spent judiciously, and in any case we must comply with the Salary Cost Management Protocol." Kevin McCabe said: "We are thrilled to be building this new partnership for Sheffield United with Prince Abdullah, who shares our vision for the Blades to join the top tier of English football. The McCabe family remains wholly committed and over the past 10 years has invested more than £90 million in rebuilding our fine and proud Club, which now has a top-class stadium, academy and junior development centre." The boards will also see new directors in Abdulraham Bin Abdullah (the Prince's son), James Phipps (the Prince's principal advisor)


Prompt: On Wednesday, Special Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression David Kaye will present his report on international legal protection for encryption and anonymity to the United Nations Human Rights Council. The report is an important contribution to the security conversation at a time when some Western leaders are calling for ill-informed and impossible loopholes in technology--a trend that facilitates surveillance and tends to enable states that openly seek to repress journalists. Ethiopia, which aggressively prosecuted a group known as the "Zone 9" bloggers for participating in email encryption training, is one such state. Authorities there jail more journalists than

any other country in Africa, other than Eritrea, and it is the fourth most censored country in the world, according to CPJ research. The Ethiopian government is suspected of conducting widespread surveillance inside the county and of hacking the computers of journalists living overseas. "In a country like Ethiopia where journalists are consistently watched, [we] need to protect their communications and their data to do reports on sensitive issues," Endalkachew H/Michael, one of the co-founders of Zone 9, told CPJ by email. "If a journalist cannot protect her communication with her sources, she cannot practice journalism." Michael, who left Ethiopia to study for his doctorate in media studies at the University of Oregon, added: "I believe encryption is a lifeblood for freedom of expression." In his report, Kaye urged states to promote strong encryption and anonymity through legislation and regulation. The report recommended eschewing restrictions on encryption and anonymity "which facilitate and often enable the rights to freedom of opinion and expression." Kaye said measures by states that weaken security online posed a "serious threat" to freedom of expression, and suggested that some common state practices and proposals were in violation of international law. The report described blanket measures such as encryption backdoors, weak encryption standards, and the holding of encryption keys in escrow as deeply problematic, and concluded that "measures that impose generally applicable restrictions on massive numbers of persons, without a case-by-case assessment," are almost certainly illegal. In order to satisfy international proportionality principles, the report said, forced decryption by governments must be made on a case-by-case basis, constrained by law, and subject to judicial warrant. The report went further, acknowledging that state regulation of encryption can be "tantamount to a ban[.]" It condemned the regulatory practices of countries including Pakistan, Cuba, and Ethiopia, noting that they interfered


Prompt: Cigarettes, damn cigarettes and statistics We cannot rely on correlation alone. But insisting on absolute proof of causation is too exacting a standard It is said that there is a correlation between the number of storks’ nests found on Danish houses and the number of children born in those houses. Could the old story about babies being delivered by storks really be true? No. Correlation is not causation. Storks do not deliver children but larger houses have more room both for children and for storks. This much-loved statistical anecdote seems less amusing when you consider how it was used in

a US Senate committee hearing in 1965. The expert witness giving testimony was arguing that while smoking may be correlated with lung cancer, a causal relationship was unproven and implausible. Pressed on the statistical parallels between storks and cigarettes, he replied that they “seem to me the same”. The witness’s name was Darrell Huff, a freelance journalist beloved by generations of geeks for his wonderful and hugely successful 1954 book How to Lie with Statistics. His reputation today might be rather different had the proposed sequel made it to print. How to Lie with Smoking Statistics used a variety of stork-style arguments to throw doubt on the connection between smoking and cancer, and it was supported by a grant from the Tobacco Institute. It was never published, for reasons that remain unclear. (The story of Huff’s career as a tobacco consultant was brought to the attention of statisticians in articles by Andrew Gelman in Chance in 2012 and by Alex Reinhart in Significance in 2014.) Indisputably, smoking causes lung cancer and various other deadly conditions. But the problematic relationship between correlation and causation in general remains an active area of debate and confusion. The “spurious correlations” compiled by Harvard law student Tyler Vigen and displayed on his website (tylervigen.com) should be a warning. Did you realise that consumption of margarine is strongly correlated with the divorce rate in Maine? We cannot rely on correlation alone, then. But insisting on absolute proof of causation is too exacting a standard (arguably, an impossible one). Between those two extremes, where does the right balance lie between trusting correlations and looking for evidence of causation? Scientists, economists and statisticians have tended to demand causal explanations for the patterns they see. It’s not enough to know that college graduates earn more money — we want


Prompt: Ryan Johansen (born July 31, 1992) is a Canadian professional ice hockey centre, an alternate captain for the Nashville Predators of the National Hockey League (NHL). Growing up, he played minor hockey in the Greater Vancouver area until joining the junior ranks with the Penticton Vees of the British Columbia Hockey League (BCHL) for one season. In 2009–10, he moved to the major junior level with the Portland Winterhawks of the Western Hockey League (WHL). After his first WHL season, he was selected fourth overall by the Blue Jackets in the 2010 NHL Entry Draft. Internationally, he has competed for

the Canadian national junior team at the 2011 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships, where he earned a silver medal and was named to the Tournament All-Star Team. In 2015, he participated in the 2015 NHL Skills Competition and was named the 2015 NHL All-Star Game MVP. Playing career [ edit ] Amateur [ edit ] Johansen was drafted into the Western Hockey League (WHL) 150th overall by the Portland Winterhawks in the 2007 Bantam Draft. Having been offered an athletic scholarship to play with Northeastern University, he opted to play for the Penticton Vees of the British Columbia Hockey League (BCHL) in 2008–09 to protect his eligibility for the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA).[notes 1][1][2] He appeared in 42 games for the Vees as a 16-year-old, scoring 5 goals and 12 assists.[2] Convinced of his ability, the Winterhawks persuaded Johansen to forego university and join their club for the 2009–10 WHL season.[1] In Portland, he joined a line with fellow 2010 NHL Entry Draft prospects Nino Niederreiter and Brad Ross.[3] He finished the year with 25 goals and 69 points in 71 games, second among league rookies behind Kevin Connauton and second in team scoring, behind Chris Francis.[4][5] Helping the Winterhawks make the playoffs one year after finishing last in the WHL,[3] they advanced to the second round. Johansen added 18 points in 13 games, ninth in league scoring and first among rookies,[6][7] despite playing in only two of four playoff rounds. Johansen rapidly climbed prospect charts for the 2010 NHL Draft, starting the year as a potential second round selection,[8] before rising to 16th among North American skaters when the NHL Central Scouting Bureau (CSB) released its mid-season ranking.[3] Johansen's coach with Penticton noted that, as one of the younger players of his draft class, his skill was often


Prompt: Today (28 June) marks the 175th anniversary of Queen Victoria’s coronation at Westminster Abbey. Naturally this major national event was attended by members of both Houses of Parliament. Although it was members of the House of Lords who performed key roles in the ceremony, with peers paying homage to the new queen, MPs also had a privileged view of proceedings, with two of the three galleries above the altar being reserved for them. (The third gallery housed the trumpeters of the orchestra.) On the morning of the coronation around 500 MPs assembled in the Commons chamber. One newspaper report recorded

that ‘Some excellent scenes took place on the entrance of Members noted for carelessness in their dress on ordinary occasions, but who appeared upon this instance in splendid attire. Mr Fector and Mr Campbell, the former of whom wore a peach-coloured velvet Court dress, while the latter was attired in the plaid of his clan, were assailed with loud cries of Hear, hear, and as they advanced up the House, the assembly of the first gentlemen in the world stood up, and with one accord shouted their acclamation’. John Fector was the House’s newest member, having been re-elected for Maidstone at a by-election less than two weeks earlier. After prayers, the Speaker announced that there would be a ballot to determine the order in which MPs would take their seats in the Abbey, and the names of counties were drawn from a glass by the Clerk of the House. The representatives of those counties and of the boroughs which lay within them then left the House in turn, the Irish county of Meath being the first to be drawn. The need to dress appropriately meant that Fector’s fellow Conservative MP for Maidstone, Benjamin Disraeli, had initially decided against attending, writing to his sister that ‘I must give up on going to the coronation, as we go in state, and all the M.P.s. must be in court dresses or uniforms. As I have withstood making a costume of this kind for other purposes, I will not make one now, and console myself by the conviction that to get up very early (eight o’clock), to sit dressed like a flunky in the Abbey for seven or eight hours, and to listen to a sermon by the Bishop of London, can be no great enjoyment’. However, Disraeli changed his mind, writing on 29


Prompt: Australian businesses have copped a bad deal in Australia’s free trade agreement with China, according to the Australian Fair Trade and Investment Network. Analysis by the AFTINET published last week shows the Australian government made “huge concessions” on temporary labour and investor rights in its “desperation” to complete the deal. While the FTA was signed last year further details were only released last week. The details of the FTA show the Australian government has increased temporary labour mobility. It has also agreed Chinese investors will be able to sue Australian governments if they can claim a change in law or

policy “harms” their investment, known as Investor-State Disputes or ISDS, but those provisions are unfinished and ambiguous. A Memorandum of Understanding separate from the text of the trade agreement gives Chinese investors in projects valued over $150 million additional rights to bring in temporary migrant workers. There is no equivalent provision for Australian firms to bring in Australians. Labour market testing of the local labour market to see if local labour is available is optional, not mandatory for the Chinese businesses. They can negotiate the numbers, occupations to be covered, English language requirements, qualifications and experience, and calculation of the terms and conditions of the Temporary Skilled Migration Income Threshold. “This means that the minimum wage to be paid to the temporary migrant workers will be the subject of negotiation between the project company and the Department of Immigration and Border Protection,” the AFTINET report says. “The minimum wages and conditions are meant to conform to Australian industrial law, but may be below the actual market rates paid to Australian workers in the industry.” But Russell Wilkinson, national head of customs and international trade at Crowe Horwath, told SmartCompany while there may be issues with the FTA it is also a win for Australian businesses. “It depends which way you look at it,” he says. Wilkinson says the agreement will allow for better market access to the Chinese economy, improve Australia’s competitive position in a rapidly growing market, promote two-way investment and reduce import costs. “There is no one way winner. Everybody has to make some sacrifices, but at the end of the day, I think on balance it looks fair,” he says. “I think, for SMEs, it’s about access into a fairly substantial market and in particular for regional small businesses. For farmers and people on the land, it’s


Prompt: Asheville Scarefest started out as a little mini-con for Pathfinder Society, back in 2013. The idea was to find a way to combine the creepiness of The Best Holiday with the joy of our favourite hobby, and it worked! We ran and played a lot of the scarier PFS games, had some pretty great costume contests, and everyone had a lot of fun. In fact, it went so well that in 2014 we could barely fit in the Wyvern’s Tale (our FLGS — Friendly Local Gaming Store). So we realized that we’d need to find a bigger place. And once

we were looking for a bigger place it occurred to us that there was no reason to limit ourselves to only one game. Most of us don’t only play one game…but for some reason the different gaming groups in the WNC area rarely wound up in the same place at the same time. So in 2015, we threw open the doors for any tabletop game that wanted to come and join us! We got a great response, and wound up running tables of D&D, Savage Worlds, Dread, Shadowrun, World of Darkness, and more. Our goal is to add more variety every year, so if you have a game you’d like to run at some point, let us know! We’ll be back at the beautiful Montreat Convention Center again this year, from October 19-21. Tickets will go on sale Tuesday, May 29th for the bargain price of $35 for the weekend. Plus, we’re offering rooms at the infinitely spooky Winsborough Lodge (we filled it last year, and had a blast), a few rooms at the elegant (and much quieter) Assembly Inn, and possibly other housing situations around the place, depending on interest. And, due to popular demand, we are also offering meal tickets for the entire weekend. Stay tuned!! Thanks, and we’ll see you there! About the denizens… Those of you who have received our newsletters have occasionally asked about the various interesting creatures that keep popping up around our offices. So for those of you who are perhaps confused by references to the Tiny Turtles, or are unsure why our Twitter feed is sometimes less than eloquent, here’s a quick primer to what’s wandered in so far… The Minions: The Minions are the core clockwork of the AVL Scarefest team, and keep the paperwork in check and the Overlord happy.


Prompt: Guardian investigation reveals death toll over 12 months with many desperately trying risky routes into UK to escape makeshift camps without sanitation at French port Facebook Twitter Pinterest Calais migrants: ‘Get to England or die trying’ At least 15 migrants in and around the French port of Calais have died in the past year as an influx of young men and women from east Africa take ever greater risks to get the UK, according to an investigation by the Guardian. Growing numbers of young families, some with children as young as three, have also arrived in the French town in

the past few months and are living in makeshift camps without sanitation or running water. The European director of the UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) described the situation as shameful and warned more people will die in the refugee camps in the coming weeks as temperatures plummet. “The conditions are totally unacceptable and are not consistent with the kind of values that a democratic society should have,” Vincent Cochetel from the UNHCR told the Guardian. “This is a shameful situation to witness in the heart of the Europe Union.” The French authorities do not generally keep a record of the migrants who die in Calais, but local charities and the UNHCR say at least 15 people, including young women and teenagers, have died in the past 12 months. Last month one man died after attempting to jump from a motorway bridge onto a moving lorry, and two more were killed in nearby Dunkirk when the truck they were hiding in caught fire. Earlier this month an Eritrean man was knocked down and killed as he looked for a lorry to board. Cochetel said he believed conditions in Calais were now worse than those at refugee camps in Turkey, where hundreds of thousands of people arrive each month to escape the bloodshed in Syria. He said the British and French governments had yet to appreciate the severity of the situation. “You will have people dying of cold and even more desperate people taking even more risks,” he said. “Some of the people there are becoming so tired and desperate that they are ready to do very dangerous things.” The French port has repeatedly hit the headlines in the past year, amid an increasingly hostile debate in the UK around immigration and asylum. As more people arrived in Calais – and conditions deteriorated