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There will be no lack of controversial issues to dissect at this year’s SXSW Conference & Festivals, which begins Friday and runs through Mar. 19. And more so than in past years, this year’s massive gathering of tech, film and music enthusiasts – usually equated with tech innovation and startups – will have a stronger-...
This week, the gathering, now in its 31st year, got another controversial issue to debate: The WikiLeaks release of thousands of documents purportedly detailing how the Central Intelligence Agency hacks into smartphones and Internet-connected televisions.
There will still be healthy servings of startups strategy, robotics and self-driving cars. But, six weeks into the Trump administration – and all the controversies that have swirled around it – SXSW this year will delve deeper than ever into how Washington could impact the tech and media worlds – a departure seemingly ...
SXSW has long had a political element to it. In 1993, then-Texas Gov. Ann Richards was the sole keynote speaker, and Al Gore, Rand Paul and Chelsea Clinton have all given talks. Last year, then-President Obama spoke at the event, drawing thousands of attendees.
But when Trump won the November election, Hugh Forrest, SXSW’s chief programming officer, knew he needed to ramp up the political programming, he said. He called his staff into a meeting to brainstorm how best to reflect the divisions and debate consuming the country. They came up with a programming track titled “Tech ...
She applauded SXSW organizers for reflecting the mood of the country in their programming. “They manage to be very nimble from year to year and come up with programming that’s very pertinent right now,” Quraishi said.
SXSW briefly became part of the political story earlier this month when a New York musician scheduled to perform at SXSW objected to language in his contract that warned that U.S. immigration agents may be contacted if an international artist violated the performance agreement.
The musician, Felix Walworth, tweeted his concern, which got nearly 4,000 retweets, and drew parallels to the increased immigration raids sweeping the country under Trump’s executive orders. SXSW officials called it a misunderstanding, stressing that no artist in its 30-year history had ever been reported to federal im...
Politics won’t just play out in panel discussions and speeches. Documentary filmmaker Jason Pollock said he considered other film festivals to premiere his film, Stranger Fruit, which explores the 2014 shooting death of Michael Brown by Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson. He chose SXSW because he hopes the multitude...
The film premieres at SXSW on Saturday, followed by a panel discussion on Monday with Pollock and Brown’s parents.
Schrode, the millennial activist, said she was initially surprised when SXSW contacted her in December and invited her to give a talk on political activism. But then she realized what a natural pairing SXSW and politics make, she said.
To the offices and members of the Theatrical Stage Employees Union Local #1 I.A.T.S.E. We regret to inform you of the passing of our brother Timothy Walters, on October 27, 2018. Reposing Aloia Funeral Home 180 Harrison Ave, Garfield MJ, 973-340-7077. Viewing Thursday 11/01/2018, from 1pm- 3pm and 7pm-9pm, at the funer...
Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) members should decide whether they were going to support President Maithripala Sirisena, who had made his stance clear, to continue with his good governance policies, said Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe.
Mr Wickremesinghe said at an election rally in Katana today that the president had clearly opposed the candidature of his predecessor and that the SLFPers had been confused by his stance. "Can a confused lot govern the country?" he asked.
He said President Sirisena had actually given a slap to the SLFP general secretary by getting a restraining order regarding the SLFP central committee meeting.
He said the SLFP had become a joke with one section calling for a central committee meeting and the other stopping it.
Many election pledges were given by Mr Wickremesinghe, who said the party would announce more plans it had made for the country.
Sorry, am I missing something? Did we see a Weda puluwang PM in the MR regime?
You forget that the UNP was a bigger joke every time you lost an election.29 times?
So the Mad king is better eh?
Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford is promising to cut an additional 12 per cent from electricity bills, despite criticizing a 25 per cent rate reduction put in place by the governing Liberals.
Recycling a pledge from former PC leader Patrick Brown’s People’s Guarantee platform, Ford said a Tory government would fund the subsidy by returning to ratepayers the province’s annual $350-million dividend from its 49-per-cent share in Hydro One.
“We all know we are paying billions more for Kathleen Wynne’s desperate attempt to cling to power,” the rookie leader told reporters Friday in Kitchener.
Like Brown’s policy, Ford’s campaign promise for the June 7 election builds upon Wynne’s controversial Fair Hydro Plan, which uses borrowed money to bankroll the 25 per cent rate cut.
“After months of denouncing the Fair Hydro Plan, Doug Ford today announced his intention to embrace the plan as the foundation of his own electricity pricing plan,” crowed a spokesman for Liberal Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault.
Ford did not mention that fact — nor did he cite Brown, who resigned amid accusations of sexual impropriety broadcast by CTV News in January. The ex-leader has denied CTV’s allegations and is suing the network for $8 million.
In the People’s Guarantee released last November, the Tories credited a Star editorial with inspiring the dividend promise.
“As Patrick Brown and the Ontario PCs have repeatedly said, there is no monopoly on a good idea. The Toronto Star editorial board had just that — a good idea — when they suggested that the province should rebate the annual Hydro One dividend to ratepayers instead of using the money for government projects,” the previou...
While Ford blasted the Liberals’ Fair Hydro Plan for its “shady accounting tricks,” his own rate-reduction proposal would bring 12 per cent relief over and above the current 25 per cent cut.
But Ford conceded that he would not immediately scrap the Fair Hydro Plan even though he has promised a “commission of inquiry” to look into the government’s accounting.
His inquiry proposal was sparked by auditor general Bonnie Lysyk’s report Wednesday, which concluded that the deficit is $11.7 billion this year, not the $6.7 billion Liberal Finance Minister Charles Sousa said in last month’s budget.
Lysyk’s difference with the Liberals stems from an accounting dispute over how the Fair Hydro Plan is funded through a government-run trust and whether about $11 billion in joint-sponsored Ontario Public Service Employees’ Union Pension Plan and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan funds can be counted toward the bottom ...
Ford has also not ruled out counting those pension holdings as assets in future accounting.
He estimated that returning the Hydro One dividend would save $70 on the hydro bill for the average family.
As well, the Tories would return conservation programs to the tax base, removing $43 from electricity bills, but adding onto taxes elsewhere.
That should save $60 for a total of $173 in lower bills annually.
“That’s 12 per cent savings on the average family’s hydro bill,” he said, adding his “modest plan” will cost the treasury a total of $800 million.
The NDP, meanwhile, is promising to cancel the Fair Hydro Plan, and bring in a 30 per cent rate reduction and buy back the privatized portion of Hydro One.
WOMEN should take an ‘egg timer’ fertility test when they are in their twenties so they know how long they have left to have a baby, an expert has warned.
The test is a simple blood analysis that measures the levels of a hormone produced in the ovary.
The hormone, called Anti-Müllerian hormone or AMH, is a good indicator of not just how many eggs a woman is carrying, but her potential responses to fertility medications and how easy it is going to be for her to fall pregnant.
Dr Luciano Nardo, of the Cheshire-based Reproductive Health Group, said knowing a woman’s egg reserve could be vital in helping them conceive in the future.
Dr Nardo, is one of the world’s foremost experts on the AMH test.
He said: “More and more women in the UK are delaying having children until later in life, often for career or relationship reasons.
“But as a woman ages, her reserve of eggs gradually diminishes, declining from around the age of 30 and dropping steeply after 35.
“And the AMH - known as the ‘egg timer’ test - allows a woman to learn exactly how likely she is to conceive.
He advised women to take the test before they turn 30 and the quality of their eggs starts to decline.
He said: “It’ll give an indication of how likely you are to conceive before you even start trying for a baby.
“And if you haven’t had any success within a few months, then the AMH can signal potential problems so that you can address them directly.
“For example, a woman with a low egg reserve might look to freeze some of her healthy eggs now so that she’ll have a greater chance of conceiving through IVF in the years to come.
According to recent stats from the British Fertility Society, roughly one in six couples in the UK will experience problems conceiving.
Most women are born with an average of two million eggs to last them a lifetime.
But every month, even during childhood, a woman loses between 55 and 1,500 eggs, as they break down and get reabsorbed into the blood stream.
The decline means that by the time a woman is able to fall pregnant, she only has around 300,000 eggs left.
That number drops dramatically to 70,000 by the time a woman reaches 30-years-old.
And even more worryingly for those struggling to conceive, once the number of eggs falls below 25,000, the number lost per cycle accelerates to an even faster rate.
So by the time a woman reaches the average menopause age of 51, she will have just 1,000 eggs left.
And it’s not just egg quantity that reduces, so too does the quality.
The older the egg the more prone they are to chromosomal damage.
Dr Nardo added: “And so you’re more likely to enjoy a natural, complication-free birth when you’re young.
“If you were to undergo and AMH test and it indicated a low ovarian reserve, that could clearly cause some anxiety.
The test costs around £150, can be done at any time during the menstrual cycle, and the results are typically returned within 24 hours.
If AMH levels are within the normal range, your ovaries will respond well to medication and boost your chances of having successful IVF.
Women with high AMH levels also have increased chances of having a successful IVF pregnancy than women of the same age with a low AMH content, as well as a good chance of freezing embryos.
Last year Zoe Hardman, former This Morning and Take Me Out: The Gossip presenter, opened up about how the egg timer test indicated she had low levels of AMH.
It prompted the 34-year-old and her partner, Paul Doran Jones, to begin trying for a baby right away and in September she gave birth to daughter, Luna..
She said: “So basically I don’t have many eggs left.
Oprah Winfrey has said President Donald Trump's victory made her rethink whether she could be elected to the White House.
Winfrey, a Hillary Clinton supporter, spoke to financier David Rubenstein in December for an interview for his Bloomberg Television show, which premiered this week.
She said that before Mr Trump's election she thought she did not have the necessary government experience to run the country but now she thinks differently.
The billionaire businessman had never before held public office before his election victory in November.
Winfrey also touched on her 25 years hosting a syndicated talk show.
She said her ultimate purpose for the show was to let people know that "we really are more alike than we are different".
One episode from the drama was met with "extreme criticism" and displeasure by Pakistani viewers.
PEMRA has issued a notice to Hum TV's drama Kitni Girhain Baaki Hain for airing homosexual content in one of its episodes.
The drama is a telefilm which features a collection of assorted love stories based on real life situations. The first season of these short stories kicked off in March 2011 and was soon followed by a second season in Oct 2016. The current season, however, has caused quite a furor among Pakistani viewers due to the obje...
The notice cited that the episode, which aired on 29th January 2017, shows two female actors, Sania Saeed and Farah Shah linked in a romantic relationship -- a subject matter which was met with "extreme criticism" as it touches upon the taboo topic of homosexuality and was immediately deemed inappropriate.
The broadcast violated the PEMRA ordinance 2002, PEMRA amended Act 2007 and Electronic Media Ethical Code 2015.
The issue states that "the topic of homosexuality is against our social, ethical and societal norms and values" due to which viewers lodged several complaints on Twitter asking PEMRA to take strict action against HUM TV.
PEMRA pointed out that HUM TV has been warned in the past to be mindful of airing sensitive content which is disliked by the public, however, the channel defied the warning.
The TV channel has been asked to clarify whether the drama has received foreign funding and what educational knowledge it is imparting on the viewers by airing such content and the purpose for highlighting this topic.
HUM TV has been given till 27th Feb 2017 to respond to the notice after which PEMRA will take action in its absence.
Huh! Talk about anything of substance and Pakistani Public will come to ban it.
The telecom sector is being taxed like non-essential items such as liquor and cigarette, instead of being treated as a critical infrastructure, according to Vodafone Idea.
"We have got customs duty at 23 per cent, GST at 18 per cent. This is pretty similar to the way you treat non-essential items like for liquor or cigarette or something.
"We paid lot of money for the spectrum, that is the reason for so much of debt that we are carrying. On top of that, you pay SUC (spectrum usage charge), USOF charges and other charges. It is overly taxed environment," Vodafone Idea CEO Balesh Sharma told PTI.
Vodafone Idea has debt of around Rs 1.2 lakh crore. Spectrum related payments account for 80 per cent of the current net debt of the company.
"There is enough lever with the government. If government believes in Digital India, they will have to believe in this (telecom sector) being a critical infrastructure and play on bringing health of the sector back," Sharma said.
He also said competition in the market is expected to rationalise as the sector has reached the optimum level of competition.
"When we talk about Digital India, it will depend on having great infrastructure, that is telecom infra. NDCP published last year very clearly calls this out...industry should no longer be treated as revenue generating machine for the government but as critical infrastructure which is not the case today," Sharma said.
The National Digital Communications Policy (NDCP) promises number of measures to rationalise levies in the sector but it is yet to show results.
Sharma also said low tariff has been hurting the national exchequer as well.
"If the prices don't go up, it is affecting government's Digital India (initiative) because industry health is in a bad shape. Government earns a heavy amount of revenue share from the industry which is nosediving. Exchequer is getting hurt," Sharma said.
Asked about the company's interest in buying additional spectrum for 5G services, Sharma said it has the highest spectrum holding in the country and does not need any further spectrum as per current business strategy.
"5G - the future technology - whatever benefits 5G can bring in current ecosystem are already being put forward by the company. In technology, later you buy the better you buy," he said.
Sharma said the company is building 5G ready telecom network.
"We have 5G like quality. However 5G ecosystem will take long time to evolve," Sharma added.
According to ratings agency Crisil, the fortunes of the telecom sector may show some signs of revival this fiscal year, with revenue seen increasing by 7 per cent on better pricing power and operating margin expanding by 350 basis points to 31 per cent.
According to telecom regulator Trai's latest data, gross revenue (GR) and adjusted gross revenue (AGR) of telecom service providers have been on the decline, barring few exceptions, after it peaked to Rs 73,344.66 crore and Rs 53,383.55 crore in the April-June 2016 quarter with average revenue per user (ARPU) at Rs 140...
GR and AGR (turnover from sale of telecom services) of the telecom service sector declined by 3.43 per cent to Rs 58,991 crore and 6.44 per cent to Rs 36,054 crore, respectively, in the three-month period ended December 2018. The government levies SUC, licence fee and other charges on AGR.

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