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Will Post Houses and DITs Be Extinct by 2017?
The media management and quality control handled by the digital imaging technician and post house is nearly universally vital in modern filmmaking, where each digital camera brings its own varying formats, workflows, and quirks. This need for DITs and post houses, however, may evaporate just as quickly as it has arisen -- at least according to the predictions of Michael Cioni. As the CEO of post house Light Iron, he has helped pioneer RED workflows at the highest level of filmmaking, so his word is not to be taken lightly -- particularly since he's predicting the end of what his and any other post house does as we know it by 2017. Furthermore, what cameras (and therefore camera teams) will have to take care of themselves is staggering, especially taking a look at the duties fulfilled by today's high-end DIT carts -- including those assembled by Light Iron itself.
"The DIT Dilemma"
On his blog FORESIGHT, Michael Cioni has written up a fascinating editorial in which he discusses a number of points in the overlapping worlds of the post house and the on-set technician, which largely appeared previously in a thread on REDUser. He highlights the lack of agreement or understanding regarding a DIT's duties, as well as the marginalized recognition of the DIT's importance many productions seem to propagate. Perhaps most importantly, he explains his own expectation that the role of the DIT will be redundant by 2020:
The data that I've collected and successfully applied into my business suggests that the post house is less desirable than ever before and in terms of dailies provisions, will not exist by 2017. Mark my words. Likewise, the sophistication of cameras continues to increase and for the DITs who have been in the game for 10 years, you know that many of the tools you used to require to "normalize" images on your cart have been absorbed into the camera itself. In fact, I predict that by 2021, all the capture, transcodes (there won't be transcodes, but the equivalent of the transcode), sync, color, windowburn, watermarking, versioning, color space conversions and even lined-script notes based on totalcode-timecode during capture will *ALL* be recorded and managed by the camera, saved to an online cloud server and instantly distributed worldwide. In other words, a significant portion of what Light Iron does today to make its money will not exists in 10 years (which is the same for thousands of people around the globe). Again, mark my words.
These predictions are based on following the data that has been compiling for 10 years, analyzing Moore's Law, talking with targets of manufacturing, evaluating the market evolution and making a few educated guesses. The result: in 2021, we will not have DITs or dailies post houses. - -Sure, I'm scared, too, but I know enough of my own abilities to predict the market that I intend to evolve along with it - as opposed to devolve in spite of it (as some foolishly attempt do). If you are a DIT today, I can assure you that you won't be a DIT in 2021. -- Maybe that's a relief:-) But it means that one needs to find ways to A) build a career that leads to professional satisfaction in the future and B) find ways to extend your relevance today as far in the future as appropriate.
Michael's post is extensive, and in context these statements possess even greater gravity, so I recommend reading the full text, "The DIT Dilemma."
What A DIT Cart Can Do -- And What Cameras of the Future Must Do to Replace Them
Moving ahead with Mr. Cioni's prediction, the weight of it becomes even better illustrated when one stops to consider the types of things a DIT does on set, with the help of specialized equipment carts -- all of which the camera team and the camera itself must complete in the future envisioned in Michael's post.
For the sake of full context, here are Light Iron's promos for its top-of-the-line DIT packages, OUTPOST and LILY PAD.
There are many DIT cart solutions available -- and to a certain extent, you may be customizing your setup from show to show as needed if you're filling the role yourself. In fact, reading up on the topic, we're looking to feature the specifics and innards of a standard DIT cart for those who are interested in the near future. Here, I include soley Light Iron configurations because this gear comes from an industry leader in production and post processing and workflow -- as such, and given how seriously Light Iron takes these matters, Michael's predictions take on all the more importance.
What about you guys -- are you able to envision a near future in which the functions of DITs, their carts, and the post house are all included in-camera?
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30 Comments
I can't wait for DITs to disappear, along with 'stereographers'. We have bad nicknames for them in our building.
However, with more and more of the pipeline moving to set, I think he's optimistic re the date.
They may not be called DITs by then, but on every large shoot the number of post people there is increasing not decreasing.
And he knows Moore's Law is a C20 thing yes? :-)
January 2, 2013 at 7:36AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I have friends who are DITs,but despite that, I believe DITs are an unnecessary expense in production. Granted, I understand that having them around can lessen the load from the DP or camera ops, but I really think there's little use for them, especially if it's just data wrangling.
It should be interesting to see how the position evolves but also how technology evolves from now til 2017.
January 2, 2013 at 8:03AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I think No Film School's trend of "question stories" like this piece is not a great one. A number of people thought the trend in mainstream journalism to "what if?" stories e.g. "what if aliens attacks Earth" "what if video games really do cause violence" ends up lowering the standards of what is be covered and deviating into endless speculation and often heated discussions about things that have not happened, are not currently happening and no real evidence.
Look at your own top stories of 2012 - that's what your audience wants. Reviews, breaking news, comparison footage, useful data. Speculation - that's fine for forums and the occasionally editorial, but as it's already getting old. As for this article, narrative filmmaking, especially features, demands really sharp people in specialized positions. It's been true for over 100 years, so unless you have hard evidence the work of narrative filmmaking has fundamentally changed (news, it's not). A "DIT" is really just a modern AC - type. Digital cameras needs are different than film camera, but somebody is always going to have to work with the camera and the images it captures. And on a demanding narrative or commercial shoot, you avoid having people wear too many hats and are often pushing technology beyond standard design limits.
And post houses going away - really? You can't be serious. 5 minutes of research on IMDB would show at exponential increase in post crew for film productions.
I understand the desire to provoke discussion and interaction - but don't let No Film School become dump for idle speculation.
January 2, 2013 at 8:40AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I'd rather get the kitchen sink and choose what I read rather than No Film School narrowing down the content. I know very little about post houses and DIT's. Now I am doing further research on these two facets of film making.....as a beginner Im increasing my knowledge of the field.
January 2, 2013 at 8:50AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
What has been true for 100 years is only based on the fact that film based workflow is mechanical and hard to automate, so required more people.
Data based workflows are driven by automation. Using off the shelf or custom software, it's possible for fewer people run many tasks. There are numerous examples of productions that have set up their own in-house teams for certain aspects of post. It'll only increase when the workflow is pure data.
If software like Adobe Anywhere works as promised, then post doesn't have to all be done in one fixed spot, so it'll be possible to have more remote collaboration.
There's a cycle of post houses disappearing and newer ones popping up. There is also more international competition. This doesn't mean that all these companies will last either. The cost of starting up is lower, but sustaining the business might not be.
DITs were video engineers in the beginning because the cameras required it. The cameras as much more user friendly now, but it doesn't mean DITs are or should be just data wranglers.
January 2, 2013 at 10:33AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I agree entirely with the writer of the comment regarding the futility of "what if" articles. Speculative journalism is a lot of fluff and padding with no real constructive worth. Analysis of current trends and practices is a lot more instructive. Having worked in the Post industry for over 20 years, including 16 years as Telecine operator/Grader at the Australian Film Television and Radio School 1090-2004, I also wrote for a number of Industry Journals and saw tremendous changes right on the wavefront of the Digital Revolution. My own research efforts in that time were based on attending SMPTE and other industry events and reading leading publications.
The last 7 years of course have heralded the total digital cine workflow right up to IMAX format, a lot quicker than most pundits predicted. Currency is relevancy, leave predictions to the mystics IMHO.
January 3, 2013 at 2:34PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
not the end of post facilities at all, just the end of places doing dalies... which once you leave NY / LA they don't exist anyway. data wrangling will still exist at some level to copy and dump camera media. Even though SSD's will get cheaper and bigger, camera's will use the space even faster with 4K to 8K transition and probably dual records of RAW and a compressed codec like ProRes or h264/5 @ 422 intraframe.
January 2, 2013 at 9:35AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Steve Oakley above is correct. The dailies business has simply morphed into on-set dailies with the D.I.T. and others. Post encompasses final color-correction, visual effects, and sound mixing, and those processes have been getting more complicated and more time-consuming over the years, not less so. But dailies are going, going, gone. We already saw that happen years ago, confirmed by the closing of Technicolor's labs, the ramping-down of film processing, and many production companies building their own "mini post" facilities to handle dailies and ingest. And many LA and NY post houses have suffered layoffs, work slowdowns, and diminished rates, caused by the pie getting sliced more finely than ever before.
But as long as studios require large screen images, complex visual effects, and huge sound mixes, those will have to be done by post houses. The key question for me is whether North America can hold on to this work. The very real possibility is that small producers will attempt to do all of this stuff on their own (with widely-varying results), and the big producers and studios will farm out most or all of this work to 3rd-world countries via massive data pipes. And these are sobering problems.
January 7, 2013 at 4:53PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Sure, in the future we may not need DIT's but they'll still be hired on every big shoot. And for a very simple and very good reason. When you're spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on your production, you NEED to make sure your footage is safe. Doesn't matter if things are automated, doesn't matter if the DIT guy doesn't even do anything. He needs to be there to make sure everything is working and to take over if the system fails.
Even if cameras can upload to cloud servers automatically, any producer worth his salt would want a hard copy. Probably two. Stored in different buildings.
January 2, 2013 at 10:11AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Until there is a total fail-safe option to back up and manage data, us DPs will always love having a second set of eyes managing the days work. I look at my camera crew as an extension of my own brain. It's nice to focus on the script with the director and keep my head in the creative sphere. Light field technology will most likely free up a portion of the 1st AC's responsibilities in the near future, not to mention the fact that 2nd AC's responsibilities have changed over the past few years tremendously. This trade can sometimes seem amorphous these days with ever changing and exponential growth in digital advances, however the human eye still out-performs the computer on error checking, creative consistency, and arbitrary daily decisions. In a perfect world, data management will always follow the post supervisors guidelines and fit into a specific workflow, but since when has anything ever gone flawlessly on a film set? One thing that has made our line of work more affordable is competition, however this competition has been the root cause of an inconsistent workflow. There are multiple NLEs with multiple codecs of varying bit rates etc etc etc. Until there is one standardized system, or until computers are powerful enough to encode all possible workflow options instantly, how can we expect DPs and or the camera department to take up the extra responsibility of data management? We already have enough on our plate as it is.
Setting all of these points aside, it's actually nice to have a trained second pair of eyes having a look over the footage on set looking for errors, inconsistencies, and glitches.
Every position in the camera department is a great position to be in to learn from the DP. The DIT has the opportunity to critically analyze the DP's work from a technical aspect. I LOVE working with the DIT. They ask me questions that get me thinking about the bits and Bytes. After all, we are in the digital sphere now! What a fascinating and modern world we live in!
Having learned from Kasparov, I am unwilling to state that computers will never replace certain taks. I just think that people are quick to assume that digital technology can replace the importance of human judgement under the constant flux of a film set and competing technologies.
January 2, 2013 at 10:12AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Well said. That's the point I forgot to mention. The improvement of technology should never add responsibility to the DP, if anything it should free up time to focus on the STORY and not the tools. When people are overworked or get rushed they are 100 times more likely to make a mistake and in our business, particularly in the camera department, a mistake can cost someone a million dollars.
January 2, 2013 at 10:27AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I don't think there will be ever one standardized system, but that shouldn't matter if everything is correctly automated.
NLEs are becoming better at handling more native file formats, so maybe no need to transcode. This becomes important when there will be much more material to sift through, so having to transcode everything will just make it harder.
Creating dailies is becoming just about instantaneous. Lots of systems out there showing that's possible.
If a workflow is figured out from the beginning, then any repeatable task can easily be automated and supervised.
I think there needs to be better handshake between production and editorial. The faster data gets from set to editorial, there can be more checks and balances.
January 2, 2013 at 10:52AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I took REDucation back in December out in LA, and Michael Cioni came in for a couple hours to talk and demonstrate everything Light Iron has been developing. It was extremely informative, and I have no doubt this is the way to go. Being able to collaborate without necessarily needing to gather every single person for dailies etc. seems key. It's freeing up who you work with, when, and where. I love the fact that you can restrict file-sharing to proximity and specific iPads as well.
January 2, 2013 at 12:21PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I have to disagree with this article entirely. Data management is still going to be very necessary pretty much forever. Cloud services have proven to be unreliable as a means for storing massive amounts of data. One of the issues is bandwidth. How do you get that 25TB Red Dragon II file into the cloud, and back out of the cloud? Sure, things can be automated and scripted, but the amount of data needed to be managed is only going to go up in the next ten years. Larger production houses/studios will always have some form of DIT, or data manager.
I think the real issue right now is how to store all of this data long term? TB hard drives are relatively cheap right now, and generally far exceed average consumer uses. But with professional video a 1TB hard drive can be blown through with just one hour of RAW footage. Then that footage has to be backed up thrice for sufficient protection. Another problem is that although SSD drives are coming down in price dramatically, it is going to be a while before we see 5TB SSD drives, or even >3TB hard drives. Ironically, the best way to archive a movie is still with film. Hence film archiving is one of the few things that Kodak is keeping post bankruptcy.
January 2, 2013 at 1:01PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
It all depends on your experience with current cloud services. Companies like Aspera pushes lots of data around for post facilities, up to 10Gbps, fast and secure. In 5 years, it'll be significantly different.
Well you'll always have and need data management. That's not going away, it's how and who manages it that evolves. DIT should evolve into a onset/post position, part of a much more significant workflow group responsible for all data needs for a production.
Studios using or creating their own data centers will likely be the norm for security reasons. All the media accessed from those data centers, through secure encrypted connections and the data centers take care of archives, data migration, etc. That's what Sony's Media Backbone does.
We already have 4TB hard drives, so seeing 6TB, and 8TB drives won't be too long, probably early 2014. But there are other solutions for archive like LTO, which may not be as cheap, is widely used.
January 3, 2013 at 7:24AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
DIT titles disappearing by 2017, maybe, but a post house... no way. If you want to talk about something other than a little tech cart that's really going to be disruptive to a post house business, then let's talk about Adobe Anywhere.
January 2, 2013 at 2:29PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Full discression, I work as a DIT, and I would say the majority of this informercial for light iron is accurate. However as some people have mentioned and was hinted at in the article there are a few things that probably need to be cleared up.
1) Many of the better DIT's working in the industry today, have made a transition over from engineering some even move up from the digital utility world. The thing that gives DIT's a bad name on the camera side of things are the guys who don't know how to work with the camera crew. Often these are the guys that come out of post houses, or even roll into the position early because they see the appeal of a large pay check, I've seen and met many of these guys and heard the horror stories.
2) The job of the DIT is a nebulous one. I absolutely agree that we won't be doing the same jobs in 2017 as we are now, I'm not doing the same things in 2013 as I was 2009 but the moniker has stayed the same. Having watched this video I would say they believe that the DIT is someone who should be off-set doing color, and dailies. This is in my opinion a very "commercial" based workflow. But honestly that's just one of the types of DIT jobs being done. There are jobs when productions hire a DIT and all the need is a loader (someone to do multiple back ups of the footage and provide checksums but no LUT is applied. The Majority of the work I do, involves creating a LUT backing up Footage and checking exposure. This is all done on set, with the DP sitting next to me and through the creating of live looks that are then fed out to the Director and Video village.
3) The advantage for a DP having a DIT on set is there is a second set of eyes watching focus and exposure (with a waveform) and if you happen to be on a show that won't allow the DP to sit in on a color session because the show is airing to soon, you can create an approximate look for what the DP and Director were going for on set, in a non destructive way in case the show runner/producer/important-person-at-the-top decides that a look should eb completely different then what was originally decided. Additionally you cna have someone who is always in direct communication with the camera dept, so the DP can communicate with the gaffer/key grip/ director without adding another dept to that list.
The advantage of a DIT for a camera Crew is that there is someone who can help out the 1 AC's with exposure (if we have a long shot and I can create the same look with the iris at a 4-5.6 instead of a 2-2.8 I will push the image more so that the AC's have a fighting chance) Additionally I'm watching there work on a 24" reference monitor and can walk them into focus on anything that might be slightly out. Seconds get someone who can confirm the roll and take number (I'm typically less then 10 feet from the script supervisor) and often I can give them a heads up on lens change or camera configuration chanage before the DP/director has made it out of the tent.
4) These carts, while pretty and robust would not work for me out in the field, and maybe that's just the shows I work on, but you try pushing a monitor and two mac towers with a raid array through the sand or mud or swamp and tell me how "mobile" your cart is. This entire workflow seems to be designed with the idea of elimnating both the production house and the DIT with some hybrind that does the same job with more people at about 80% of the effectiveness. (and I'm guessing more then 80% of the cost.
5) To me data management is the most important job on set now whether that job is done by a DIT or a loader or a post house on wheels or an honest to goodness post house, I do not see that position going away anytime in the near future (or even the distant future) The departure from Film to Digital has enabled Directors to adopt the "keep rolling" mentality so that now most of the productions I work on are shooting in the 25-50:1 ratio the more that people can continue to safely back up that data, the more data will come in.
6) It's my opinion to that the DIT should know the camera better then anyone else on set, including the 1st but I'm open to that debate, and as these cameras become less field serviceable I think that need for knowledge will go away, you'll just bring out the back up camera body and keep shooting if one goes down.
I believe the DIT job could well disappear in the next 5 years, but I think it will be replaced by something that will adopt the skill sets of most DIT's today. The post house will most likely not disappear but I could see an end of the line for dailies houses if they don't adapt (as steve said- though as a note I'm out of atlanta where there are 7 dailies houses that I know of and work in wilmington where there are at least 2. So I think they maybe a little more common then just being in LA/NYC).
January 3, 2013 at 6:05AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Why single out DITs who started out in post houses as having a bad rap? Most of the tasks DITs do started in the post side. I can understand if there are individuals who can't handle the on chaos of a set, otherwise it's a bad generalization.
January 3, 2013 at 7:47AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
Fair enough, it's my own personal experience. I'm sure there are some good guys that have come from post houses, but the "bad DIT's" that have moved from post to on set don't seem to handle it well. That was the only generalization I intended to make.
Also while there is definitely a "post"mark on the DIT job. When I first started as a DIT it was on the f900 in 2004 I was responsible for the proper set up and white balance of the camera, when a board got knocked loose I replaced it, and I was responsible for signal flow. Later I became responsible for exposure, it wasn't until I was charged with physically matching individual cameras and applying a specific look that I even approached the work that was done on the "Post side"
Of course now that's all different, most of my work is copying, creating luts and monitoring exposure, the first two coming out of a "post" world. Which again shows you how much the job can shift in such a short amount of time. The issue that I have is when people see the DIT as a "downloader" which some folks come in as and then as a result make the rest of us look bad because they don't understand any other aspects of the job.
January 3, 2013 at 10:09AM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
I don't believe that DIT's won't be necessary anymore since I haven't seen a system that doesn't need maintenance. As image capturing systems evolve and perform an increasing amount of tasks, there will also be an increasing amount of errors, problems, etc. Don't be naive and think the future will be somehow different in this respect. Look at all the bugs that the digital era brought too. And all those people who had to spend hours on end in front of internet boards. This is something one shouldn't understimate. Often testing and refactoring isn't done properly due to time and money restrictions. I've experienced it myself often enough and I don't see anything changing here. Making a system stable is one thing - but you can't automise everything.
January 3, 2013 at 1:29PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
That 1take infomercial was so cool!!
January 3, 2013 at 1:46PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
When I started, waay back in the 1970s there were three kinds pf workflows.
1. Shoot on video and finish on video.
2. Shoot on film and finish on video.
3. Shoot on film and finish on film.
1 & 2 required post houses and 3 required optical houses (a post house for film).
Until they figure out a way to add titles and CGI (in real time) as the production is shot, post houses ain't going anywhere.
January 3, 2013 at 7:12PM, Edited September 4, 7:54AM
You obviously shoot EX3 jobs still...
Kind of jobs us DIT's work on are the kind of jobs where you need 3 Red Epics or Arri Alexa XT's. Where the DOP would like the LUT on the camera or the monitor in real time and the dailies to look the same.
Show me a camera op or DOP who can handle this workflow... ;)
October 19, 2013 at 12:36AM, Edited September 4, 8:21AM
Thanks for taking the time to share your opinion. I completely agree with you.
End Is Near...
When I began my DIT career 3+ years ago all the DIT's in where going on about how DIT's will only last another year. Look at us today with Red Dragon & Alexa XT. DIT's are here to stay for while still.
If you wanna truly understand the role of the DIT then all you have to do is have a look at the Photographic Digital Assistants who have been in the game for longer then our modern DIT's. They are still in full swing on larger/professional jobs. We can really learn from these guys and they should not be underestimated as they have been ands on with RAW files for 5+ years now.
Current Tech
I'm currently building a 24 Core Machine with all the bells and whistles for half the price of the Light Iron box on wheels. So I can keep up with any post house, I don't have to cover the cost of office space, employees etc etc
Nothing like giving the DOP & Director a synced copy of todays rushes with LUT on an iPad @ wrap.
Future Tech
And soon we will all be shooting 16bit IMAX resolution in the cameras as a standard.
Cameras will always be small and compact as they need to hand held and able to fit onto a drone etc.
Therefore this gives us the advantage as we will have to have the machine capable of Backing Up & Transcoding these large files onset to support the camera.
The Real Debate
The real debate is not where we will be around, we know we are a necessity and wether people like it or not we are necessary part of the production process. And a really inexpensive solution to the very expensive film lab process.
The real debate is wether there the Post House or the DIT does the Dailies?
And who charges how much for these services?
October 19, 2013 at 1:21AM, Edited September 4, 8:21AM
Change is the only constant. Embrace it instead of complaining about it and you'll be golden. I've been a Digital Tech on the stills side for 8+ years now and it has not stayed the same - the cameras and raw workflows have gotten much better and more reliable but more importantly, the shooters and the rest of the crew are completely familiar with the process now, meaning it isn't quite so much of a mystery any longer. The DT is focusing much more on the final image now, whereas they were more focused on the capture of the raw data and some intermediate files a couple years ago. But the demands are just as strenuous/demanding and when the data stops flowing... well, the DT is there to make sure the crew keeps working.
November 6, 2013 at 7:32PM, Edited September 4, 8:21AM
I found NoFilmSchool quite informative but i do not agree with this claim from Light Iron's boss and the speculative approach here. There is an unhealthy development going on in the film vfx industry, editors suddenly become colorists, apps suggest that one person can do it all, look at Nuke and Smoke, more and more 3d tools, particles and what not. Fact is that you need still highly specialized operators aka digital artists to do fluid sims, or animators who need years of honing their skills. Movies are not made by software applications nor any semi-automated hardware bundles or whatsoever. So stating post facilities will be gone and everything is going to be cloud based and the camera will do it alone is quite bold and far from reality. Good example 2d to 3d conversions, Gravity was painfully crafted by hundreds of artists, show me how a machine will do that in the near future even driven by cleverly build AI driven algorithm. My opinion is that there will be many more specialists and their skills will be in high demand no matter how far technological advancements go now or in the near future. Just my 2 cents.
January 2, 2014 at 2:00AM, Edited September 4, 8:45AM
I agree. I've been a DMT/DIT since 2008 and I'd just like to add that the only reason that DIT's are even a part of the Camera dept. has nothing to do with them being suited to that dept, but rather because IATSE happened to win the battle over the DGC. Had the DGC won, DIT/DMT's would be part of the post department...and IMHO, that's where they belong. The shows that I work on, I find I collaborate a lot more with the editor than with the AC's or DoPs.
July 27, 2014 at 12:35PM, Edited September 4, 8:56AM


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Tax credits help bring jobs to hard-hit Wilmington
DealerTrack will hire 213 employees
A southwest Ohio city hit hard by job losses during the recession is getting help in spurring job creation from state tax incentives.
The Ohio Tax Credit Authority approved tax breaks for DealerTrack in Wilmington, a city that lost thousands of jobs when package delivery company DHL moved from its air park. DealerTrack expects to create 213 new full-time jobs with expansion of its automotive contract and title services.
Tax breaks for two other companies are expected to add 65 Wilmington jobs.
The Dayton Daily News reports that the executive director of Clinton County's regional commission says the area takes pride in having weathered an economic disaster. Chris Schock says people are focused on the future.
Statewide, tax breaks were approved recently for 13 projects to create 1,417 jobs.

subset: commoncrawl


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So more than a confetti birthday cake to mark my upcoming plunge into old age, it seems that the artichoke sitting on my kitchen counter is, in its own way, a birthday token.
Why do we leave artichokes for old people? Are we scared that we might trim them wrong, or steam them for too long, or bare our teeth too much when eating the flesh? I'll admit that I was scared of the trimming part, terrified that I'd trim to much, but as it turns out that's pretty close to impossible. Our friends Aude and Rus shared an artichoke with us the other night and they admitted to being turned off my an incidence whereby an artichoke wasn't steamed for long enough. And then there was the artichoke we shared with our friend Jess who asked when we got to the hairy covered heart, "now what?"


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On Tuesday, NYPD arrested six individuals who ran OWS' Globalrevolution.tv. According to law enforcement, the place where the individuals inhabited was "imminently perilous to life" and was a threat to the inhabitant's health. Some say health concerns aren't the real issues and claim NYPD tactics are changing and they are now targeting individuals. Goldie, OWS activist, gives us his take on the website shutdown and why he refuses to use his last name.
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UBS News
UBS further materially de-risks balance sheet through transaction with Swiss National Bank
UBS to raise CHF 6 billion of new capital through mandatory convertible notes, fully placed with Swiss Confederation
The Swiss National Bank (SNB) and UBS have reached an agreement to transfer up to USD 60 billion of currently illiquid securities and other assets from UBS's balance sheet to a separate fund entity.
With this transaction, UBS caps future potential losses from these assets, secures their long-term funding, reduces its risk-weighted assets, and materially de-risks and reduces its balance sheet.
This transaction allows the SNB and shareholders of UBS to participate in the recovery potential of the entity's assets once the loan is fully repaid.
The solution significantly reduces the uncertainty for UBS shareholders and clients and contributes to the stability of the financial system by ensuring an orderly sale of these assets.
The fund will be capitalized with up to USD 6 billion of equity capital provided by UBS and a non-recourse loan in the maximum amount of USD 54 billion provided to the fund by the SNB. The entity will be controlled by the SNB. UBS will sell its equity interests to SNB for USD 1 and will have an option to repurchase the equity once the loan is fully repaid for a purchase price of USD 1 billion plus half of the equity value exceeding USD 1 billion.
To fund its equity contribution, and at the same time maintain its strong capital position, UBS can raise CHF 6 billion of new capital in the form of mandatory convertible notes (MCN). The MCN has been fully placed with the Swiss Confederation.
The Swiss National Bank and UBS announce today a comprehensive solution to materially de-risk and reduce UBS's balance sheet.
Peter Kurer, Chairman of UBS said, "In these turbulent times we want to ensure that we do everything possible to safeguard the solidity of our bank. We are taking practical steps to eliminate legacy risks. We thank the Swiss Government and the Swiss National Bank for their willingness to develop a commercial solution under economic terms that will support both the stability of the Swiss financial system and UBS. Their efforts and decisiveness to act swiftly demonstrates the professionalism of the Swiss financial centre, to which we are deeply committed".
Marcel Rohner, Group CEO said, "This transaction gives comfort in UBS's future. The extremely difficult market environment led us to accelerate our risk reduction with a definitive move. Our aim is to protect our clients from the impact of the crisis to the fullest extent possible and to provide our shareholders an opportunity to renew their confidence in the bank. Our shareholders have borne the losses from this crisis. They now have the certainty that our risks related to these distressed assets have been substantially removed while still participating in the recovery of these assets".
Up to USD 60 billion in assets to be transferred to new entity, fully owned and controlled by SNB
Based on an agreement with the SNB, UBS will transfer up to USD 60 billion of assets to a newly created fund entity. UBS will capitalize the fund with equity of up to USD 6 billion.
The SNB will finance the fund with a loan of up to USD 54 billion, secured on the assets of the fund. At the time it grants the loan, the SNB will take over control and ownership of the entity by purchasing the equity for a nominal price of USD 1. The loan will be non-recourse to UBS, assuming no change of control of UBS and will be priced at LIBOR plus 250 basis points. It will mature in eight years, but the maturity may be extended to 10 or 12 years.
The USD 6 billion equity will absorb any potential realized losses up to this amount.
The purpose of the fund is to ensure an orderly financing and liquidation of securities that are currently illiquid as well as other assets from UBS's balance sheet over the long-term.
The assets transferred into the fund include around USD 31 billion (as per valuation at 30 September 2008) of primarily cash securities, previously disclosed in these categories:
US sub-prime
US Alt-A
US prime
US commercial real estate and mortgage-backed securities
US student loan auction rate certificates and other securities backed by student loans
US reference-linked note program (RLN) 1
At completion of the transaction, UBS's net exposure in these risk categories will be reduced to nearly zero (compared to USD 44.2 billion on 30 June 2008), with residual long positions held by UBS in these asset classes hedged through existing short positions, including credit protection embedded in the RLN programs.
UBS will also transfer additional, mainly non-US debt instruments with a total net value of USD 18 billion to the fund - a wide range of securities backed by a variety of asset classes. The inclusion of these positions follows UBS's decision to downsize its securitization business and provides a better diversification of the fund's portfolio.
The transfer of the USD 49 billion of assets will take place over the coming months, during fourth quarter 2008 or first quarter 2009, but will be priced at valuations as of 30 September 2008. These prices will be verified by independent third parties and potential differences will be recorded in the bank's income statement.
UBS will have the right to transfer up to an additional USD 9 billion of assets into the fund at a later stage. These include up to USD 5 billion of student loan auction rate securities the bank may buy back from clients as part of the recent settlements and up to USD 3.5 billion of positions which may become unhedged in the event of commutation of the credit protection contracts with one or more monoline insurers. 2
UBS will act as the investment manager of the fund, overseen by a board controlled by the SNB. The oversight board will approve specified matters including certain major transactions and changes in investment guidelines. It will also be empowered to change the investment manager.
As part of this transaction, UBS has been granted the option to buy back the equity of the entity, once the loan is fully repaid, by paying the SNB USD 1 billion plus 50% of the amount by which the equity value at the time of exercise exceeds that amount. Any remaining equity up to USD 1 billion will go to the SNB and UBS will participate in 50% of the equity value exceeding USD 1 billion. The option will be carried on UBS's balance sheet at its fair value.
If - over the life of the transaction - the fund equity declines in value, the SNB will be able to participate in some manner in the appreciation of the UBS share price. The arrangement will be based on no more than 100 million UBS shares and will be further defined early next year.
The transaction will result in a significant reduction in UBS's risk-weighted assets and its balance sheet total. The impact of the transaction and related capital measures will be shown in the fourth quarter results separately from the operating performance. On a preliminary basis, UBS estimates that the transaction will result in a charge against earnings of approximately CHF 4 billion. These impacts would produce a year-end Tier 1 ratio of approximately 11.5%, before any other fourth quarter effects.
UBS to raise CHF 6 billion of new capital to fund entity
UBS will raise CHF 6 billion of new capital in the form of mandatory convertible notes (MCN). This will allow the bank to retain a strong Tier 1 capital ratio, even after providing the equity to the newly established entity. The MCN has been fully placed with the Swiss Confederation. The Swiss Confederation reserves the right to reduce part or all of its investment by transferring the MCN to third party investors.
The MCN issue is subject to approval by UBS shareholders who will vote on the creation of the required conditional capital underlying the MCN at an extraordinary general meeting (EGM) to be held in late November 2008. The MCN will count as Tier 1 capital for BIS capital adequacy purposes following EGM approval. Issuance of the MCN is expected to take place five business days after the EGM.
The MCN will pay a coupon of 12.5% until conversion into UBS registered shares, which must take place no later than 30 months after issuance.
The MCN will have a minimum conversion price corresponding to the reference price and a maximum conversion price set at 117% of the reference price.
The reference price of the MCN will be determined as the lower of:
the volume-weighted average price (VWAP) of UBS shares on SWX Europe on the trading day preceding this announcement (CHF 20.24 on 15 October 2008), and
the average of the daily VWAP on each of the three trading days ending on the day before the EGM.
However, in no case will the reference price be less than CHF 18.21, or 90% of the VWAP of 15 October, 2008.
Upon conversion of the MCN, the Swiss Confederation will hold approximately 9.3% of UBS's share capital, on the basis of currently outstanding shares and assuming conversion of the mandatory convertible notes issued in March 2008.
A summary of the terms and conditions of the MCN can be found at www.ubs.com/media. UBS shareholders will be provided with more details on the proposed transactions together with the invitation to the EGM.
Update on third quarter results
In line with the pre-announcement on 2 October, UBS recorded a small net profit attributable to its shareholders of CHF 296 million for third quarter 2008.
Estimated third quarter results by division are:
Global Wealth Management & Business Banking's profit before tax rose 66% from second quarter 2008 to CHF 1,862 million. The previous quarter, however, included a provision of CHF 919 million for the expected costs of the repurchase of auction rate securities and related costs, including fines.
Global Asset Management's pre-tax profit was CHF 414 million, up 18% from the previous quarter. This includes an extraordinary gain of approximately CHF 168 million from the previously announced disposal of Adams Street Partners.
The Investment Bank's pre-tax result was negative CHF 2,748 million, compared to a loss of CHF 5,233 million in the second quarter. As credit spreads widened in the third quarter, the Investment Bank recorded gains of CHF 2,207 million on own credit (compared to CHF 122 million in second quarter). Disclosed concentrated risk positions were significantly reduced by USD 13.5 billion, mainly through the sale of assets. Writedowns and losses on those disclosed positions totaled USD 4.4 billion (compared to USD 5.1 billion in second quarter), recorded in the Investment Bank's Fixed Income, Currencies and Commodities (FICC) business. Revenues were down across businesses, in line with prevailing market conditions.
Corporate Center recorded a pre-tax loss of CHF 7 million (CHF 330 million in second quarter).
Group results in third quarter include a tax credit of CHF 912 million.
Costs were again reduced across the bank, with cuts in discretionary spending and lower personnel expenses, reflecting lower staff levels and a decrease in bonus accruals in line with business performance.
During third quarter, UBS reduced its balance sheet by around CHF 80 billion to CHF 1,997 billion. UBS's total BIS capital ratio on 30 September was estimated at 14.8% and its Tier 1 ratio at approximately 10.8%, compared to 15.7% and 11.6% respectively at the end of June.
Wealth Management & Business Banking invested assets were CHF 1,932 billion. The division recorded net new money of negative CHF 49.3 billion in the third quarter, with a significant part of the outflow taking place in the last few weeks of the quarter. Global Asset Management invested assets were CHF 708 billion with net new money negative 34.4 billion.
With today's measures, in addition to its earlier steps, UBS is confident that it has created the conditions necessary to reverse the outflow of client assets.
UBS's concentrated risk positions were reduced substantially during the quarter. The table below shows on a pro forma basis the impact of the announced transaction on these positions.
In line with the recently announced re-positioning of the Investment Bank, UBS will continue to manage capital and resources carefully and diligently.
More detailed third quarter results will be disclosed on 4 November 2008, as planned.
1) The US reference-linked program will continue to be operated by UBS.
2) The difference between the maximum facility size of USD 60 billion and the total amount of securities described above resulted from asset sales and write-downs from mid September to the 30 September valuation date.


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Mosh Jelton Vs Knowledge Medina Rap Battle (Most Anticipated One Yet) [Grind Time]
This is the one everyone has been waiting for. 2nd place Knowledge Medina (2-0) takes on Mosh Jelton (1-2), one of the leagues best. Grind Time Battle. Shout out to David
Please click the "Report" button below if the video on this page is not working properly.
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Another two down, seven to go until "The Voice" crowns its third winner!
After last night's stellar performance show, all bets were off when it came to the NBC reality hit's elimination show on Tuesday, Nov. 20, in which two more contestants were sent home.
Christina Aguilera, Cee Lo Green, Adam Levine and Blake Shelton were all super nervous at the beginning of tonight's show, but which two were forced to say goodbye to their contestants by night's end?
U.S. & World
News from around the country and around the globe
Missed last night's episode? Get caught up with our recap!
The two contestants eliminated from the competition were Sylvia Yacoub and Bryan Keith.
From Team Christina, Sylvia earned praise from all of the coaches last night with her rendition of "Girl on Fire," with Adam calling it her best performance on the show yet. New Yorker Bryan performed Billy Joel's "New York State of Mind" and coach Adam told him he "did the song justice." Christina now only has one contestant remaining in the competition, Dez Duron, while Blake and Adam all have two singers left. Cee Lo is the only coach with three performers still in it to win it.
As for the night's performances, Cee Lo's contestant Cody Belew and Team Blake standout Cassadee Pope got to share the stage with Rascal Flatts, while Adam performed "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" with his team.
Were you sad to see these two go? Sound off in the comments!
(E! and NBC are both part of the NBCUniversal family)


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What, exactly, is Old Tom gin? That was Oregon winemaker and distiller Tad Seestedt's first question, when a friend suggested he try making a gin in the "Old Tom" style.
It was a question most anyone would have asked, and in 2006, when the conversation transpired, there was no hard-and-fast answer. Gin's missing link is the easiest way to describe it. Old Tom is the long-lost cousin that helps make sense of the idea that malty Dutch genever and sharp-edged London dry gin are members of the same family. Old Tom is lighter and less intense than the former, more viscous and fuller-bodied than the latter, with a sweetness derived from naturally sweet botanicals, malts or added sugar. And once upon a time, it was a common sight behind the bar.
In the mid- to late-19th century, sports and sots who entered a saloon and called out "Gin!" would be handed either genever or Old Tom. Page through any cocktail book from the late 1800s and you'll find dozens of recipes calling for it. Harry Johnson's famous Bartender's Manual of 1882 listed the spirit as an essential liquor "required in the bar room." By the next century, though, it had been surpassed and supplanted by the London dry style of gin typified by Beefeater, Tanqueray and the like. The dawn of the current millennium, meanwhile, left Old Tom as unremembered as last night's bender.
Modern bartenders, however, lust after what they can't get, particularly if it gets in the way of their building a pre-Prohibition cocktail. Soon enough, calls for the resurrection of Old Tom mounted. "We were asked by many people if we had considered producing an Old Tom gin," says James Hayman, the maker of Hayman's Old Tom Gin, which was launched in 2007 and is arguably the most widely known of the new Old Toms. "The cocktail community was becoming increasingly interested in being able to make classic cocktails with the correct ingredients."
Unlike Seestedt, who collaborated with cocktail historian David Wondrich—the friend who'd suggested he make an Old Tom—until they hit upon a formula that seemed to echo past descriptions of the vanished elixir, Hayman didn't need to create a recipe from scratch. A descendent of the Burroughs clan, which founded Beefeater, he was in possession of an old family blueprint, dating from the 1860s. The recipe produced a spirit that had gin's distinctive juniper snap but was softer, smoother and more approachable. "The company stopped production of Old Tom gin in the 1950s," tells Hayman, who's based outside London. "After the Second World War, trading conditions were difficult for any company, including ours. My grandfather, Neville Hayman, was an accountant, but he represented the interests of my grandmother—who was a Burrough—on the board. He helped shape the company to ensure it survived. Therefore, ironically, my grandfather would have been involved in our stopping production of Old Tom."
If the arrival of Hayman's unfamiliar new/old product confused consumers, the appearance of Seestedt's Ransom Old Tom Gin in early 2009 befuddled them further. Both bottlings were called Old Tom, but otherwise they seemed nothing alike. For one thing, Hayman's was clear, while Ransom was light brown, the hue of young whiskey. Their taste profiles varied widely as well.
Ransom is the marriage of a base wort of malted barley and a high-proof corn spirit infused with a fairly simple potpourri of botanicals (juniper, coriander, orange, lemon, angelica root and cardamom). The final distillation is run through an alembic pot still and then aged in wine barrels. The wood lends the gin its color and gives the gin a drier, more tannic bite than is the case with Hayman's. "The idea behind doing a relatively short aging in barrels was to try to duplicate what would have happened years ago," says Seestedt. "The gin would have been put in barrels and then shipped to its designation."
"I helped Tad identify a list of the most interesting characteristics the Old Toms had and he combined them all in one," says Wondrich. "In other words, the idea wasn't to make an average Old Tom, but rather one that most differentiated from London dry."
Of the two, Hayman's is notably sweeter. This can largely be chalked up to the fact that Hayman adds sugar, whereas Seestedt does not. Seestedt contends that "the combination of pot distillation, malted barley and barrel-aging gives the impression of a slight sweetness, more body and greater viscosity." But there's a bit of historical controversy on this point. "Some state that some Old Tom gin was sweetened with botanicals," said Hayman. "I personally don't believe that. We have found nothing to confirm that."
The personality gap between Hayman's and Ransom would, at first blush, cause one to assume that one or the other distiller had taken a wrong turn on the way to re-creating Old Tom. But Old Tom was once a broad style, with as many exemplars as London dry has today. There was no uniform standard. "When Ransom came out, you started to realize that within the category of Old Tom—just like the category of London dry—there was a lot of [variation]," says Derek Brown, owner of the Washington D.C. bars The Passenger and Columbia Room.
Brown began pouring Old Tom the moment Hayman's hit the market. "It's a little maddening. You look back on these old cocktail recipes and think, 'Dammit, Jerry Thomas, why didn't you tell us WHICH Old Tom you used?' It's one of the great mysteries of cocktail history."
Follow the Black Cat
If the first question people ask about Old Tom is "What is it?," the second is usually about how it got its peculiar name. Again, there's no simple answer.
As with many lost liquors, the history behind Old Tom is a patchwork of partial facts, incomplete information, and the kind of yarns that provoke cocked eyebrows. Most of the tales involve a black cat—the tom in question. Hayman's reports that back in 1736, one Captain Dudley Bradstreet lucked into both a piece of London property and a stock of gin. Bradstreet hung a sign depicting a painted cat in the window and let it be known that doses of sweet mother's ruin could be had at the address. "Under the cat's paw sign was a slot and a lead pipe, which was attached to a funnel inside the house," reads a history put together by Hayman's. "Customers placed their money in the slot and duly received their gin. Bradstreet's idea was soon copied all over London. People would stand outside houses, call 'puss' and when the voice within said 'mew,' they would know that they could buy bootleg gin inside. Very soon Old Tom became an affectionate nickname for gin."
Another explanation proffered by Joseph Boord, the man behind the company believed to be the first to bottle Old Tom gin in the mid-1800s, said the name referred to an old guy named Tom who worked at his distillery. However, Boord's label prominently featured a black cat perched atop a barrel.
One thing is for sure. At some point in the mid-1800s, the image of a dark feline became fixedly associated with Old Tom. An 1858 article in The New York Times mentioned that a brand called Old Tom London Dock Gin bore the image of a big Maltese cat on the label. And an 1892 report in the paper, an attempt to get to the bottom of the name's origin, stated, "It is related that [Old Tom gin] was sold in a surreptitious way in 1733 by a man who had for a sign a black cat, but 'Notes and Queries' doubts this."
A New Old Taste
Regardless of its origin, Brown says Old Tom is the perfect antidote for his gin-phobic customers: "They'll say, 'I don't like gin.' You say, 'OK, but try this.' And they say, 'Oh, I like THIS.' Well, that's gin. Old Tom gin."
Austin, Texas, bartender and beverage director Bill Norris agrees. "For me, it can be more versatile than London dry," he says. "It's not as aggressively flavored. So some of the more subtle nuances don't get overwhelmed by the juniper influence. The alcohol is a bit lower, it's a little sweeter and doesn't have that botanical bite."
Norris has two Old Tom cocktails on the list at Midnight Cowboy, one of the bars he oversees, including the Hauptmann Cocktail, a mix of Ransom, orgeat, orange and lemon juices, shaken with an egg white and topped with a few dashes of orange bitters. He's also a fan of a Martini composed of equal parts Hayman's and Dolin dry vermouth. "Before dinner, if you don't want to blow your palate out, it's a great option."
Bartenders are particularly fond of using Old Tom gin to build a Martinez or a Tom Collins, two cocktails that historically called for the spirit, as well as more recent creations like the Casino, a 19th-century formula that mixed Old Tom with lemon juice and maraschino liqueur. "You read so much about Old Tom in the history of cocktails," says Brown. "Save from finding an ancient bottle on eBay, which I was never able to do, I was never able to make those drinks." Prior to the dawning of Hayman's, Brown tried to make homemade Old Tom, basically by adding sugar to a London Dry. The results were less than satisfactory. Now, armed with two Old Tom gins, and his standby London Drys, Brown likes to experiment. "When you make a Martinez with Beefeater, then Plymouth, Hayman's, Ransom and Bols, and try them all, you have five different cocktails."
Sales of both Hayman's and Ransom have grown steadily over the last few years, according to its makers, and now a few other brands have followed in their footsteps, including Jensen in the UK and Sound Spirits in Seattle, which rolled out its Old Tom this summer, with distribution in Washington state. Sound Spirits follows Ransom's example by giving the gin some age and color—though, in this case, with oak chips.
But don't expect Old Tom to reclaim the towering place it once held in the gin world. "Old Tom gin is a niche category," admits Hayman, "but it is respected by those who understand its role in the history of gin."


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Real Salt Lake Shifts Focus to CONCACAF Champions League Play for First Two Group A Contests;
Tickets Remain for Wednesday's 8:00 p.m. Kickoff at Rio Tinto Stadium against Panama's Arabe Unido;
Panamanian Champs to Hold Practice & Media Availability at Rio Tinto Stadium on Tuesday Evening
SANDY, Utah (Monday, August 16, 2010) – After climbing to second place on Major League Soccer's overall table over the weekend, Real Salt Lake (11-4-6, 39 pts.) will take a brief hiatus from regular season play over the next two weeks to focus on its first-ever appearance in the CONCACAF Champions League. The defending MLS Cup champions will start Group A round-robin play in the regional club championship this Wednesday, Aug. 18, when the Claret-and-Cobalt welcome Panamanian champs Arabe Unido to Rio Tinto Stadium for an 8:00 p.m. kickoff.
Tickets for Wednesday's historic contest in Sandy, which cost just $15 in all seating areas (excluding Club seats), remain available and can be purchased online at www.RealSaltLake.com and www.RioTintoStadium.com, over the phone at 801-727-2700, and in person at the Rio Tinto Stadium Box Office weekdays from 10:00 a.m.-6:00 p.m.
Real Salt Lake's international competition debut will be televised live by Fox Soccer Channel, while fans can also follow the action as it unfolds via RSL's official radio partners – ESPN 700 Sports (English), ESPN Deportes 1600-AM and Homero 106.1-FM (Spanish) – and the club's official Twitter feed, found at www.twitter.com/RealSaltLake.
After having this weekend off from match action, Real Salt Lake will continue CONCACAF Group A play during Matchweek #2 next Wednesday, Aug. 25, when the Utah side will travel to Mexico City to face the runner-up of the tournament each of the past two seasons, Cruz Azul. Kickoff for that contest is slated for 6:00 p.m. MT, and fans can again follow live on Fox Soccer Channel, ESPN 700, ESPN Deportes 1600-AM, and Homero 106.1-FM. Real Salt Lake will look to make history during the trek down to Mexico City, as no Major League Soccer side has been able to defeat a Primera Division team in CONCACAF play on Mexican soil.
Click here for more on Real Salt Lake's initial run in the CONCACAF Champions League and additional information on the 2010/11 edition of the regional club championship.
Panamanian Champs Arabe Unido to Hold Practice & Media Availability at Rio Tinto Stadium on Tuesday Evening
Prior to Wednesday's CONCACAF Champions League Group A opener, the visiting champions from Panama, Arabe Unido, will conduct a practice at Rio Tinto Stadium on Tuesday evening beginning at 5:30 p.m. MT. The training session will be open to members of the media, with interview availability for Arabe Unido players and coaches to follow.
Real Salt Lake Schedule: August 16-25, 2010 (all times MT unless noted)
All RSL practices are open to members of the media and the general public unless otherwise noted, with media availability for all players and coaches to immediately follow each session. Those planning on attending any session can confirm the time and location of that day's training by calling 801-918-5050.
Monday, August 16: Off Day
Tuesday, August 17: Training at Rio Tinto Stadium – 11:00 a.m.
- Arabe Unido training session at Rio Tinto Stadium – 5:30 p.m.
Wednesday, August 18: Real Salt Lake v. Arabe Unido (PAN)
- CONCACAF Champions League – Group A – Matchweek #1
- 8:00 p.m. MT kick-off at Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy, Utah
- TV: Fox Soccer Channel
- Radio: ESPN 700 (America First Credit Union Pre-match Report begins at 7:00 p.m.), ESPN Deportes 1600-AM, and Homero 106.1-FM
Thursday, August 19: Training/Regeneration at Rio Tinto Stadium – 11:00 a.m.
Friday, August 20: Off Day
Saturday, August 21: Training at Rio Tinto Stadium – 11:00 a.m.
Sunday, August 22: Off Day
Monday, August 23: Travel to Mexico City; training TBD
Tuesday, August 24: Training in Mexico City – site/time TBD
Wednesday, August 25: Real Salt Lake at Cruz Azul (MEX)
- CONCACAF Champions League – Group A – Matchweek #2
- 6:00 p.m. MT kick-off at Estadio Azul in Mexico City, Mexico
- TV: Fox Soccer Channel
- Radio: ESPN 700 (America First Credit Union Pre-match Report begins at 5:00 p.m.), ESPN Deportes 1600-AM, and Homero 106.1-FM
www.RealSaltLake.com / www.RioTintoStadium.com / www.RSLtotheCore.com / www.ESPN700Sports.com


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American public elementary and secondary schools spend about $20 billion a year on what is called professional development — helping teachers do their jobs better. Many teachers will tell you much of that is a waste of time and money.
Now, three former teachers involved in training have discovered an important reason. Teachers are rarely given time and opportunity to practice what they have learned.
"Practice Perfect: 42 Rules for Getting Better at Getting Better" is the new book by Doug Lemov, Erica Woolway and Katie Yezzi exposing this flaw in teacher training and the way most of us learn any complex skill. Professional athletes know the value of repeating moves again and again before the game starts. Michael Jordan was famous for how much time he spent practicing in the gym, even after he became a superstar.
But the rest of us either don't see that or, as in my case, are too lazy to make the effort.
For teachers, the authors of "Practice Perfect" write, pregame repetition is crucial. "If a teacher's performance during a given class is less than what she wanted, she cannot get it back," they say. "She cannot as, say, a lawyer working on a contract might do, stop in the middle of her work and call someone to ask for advice. She can't give it her best shot and then, as we are doing as we write this book, go back and tinker and revise and have the luxury of being held accountable for a final product that reflects actions taken and reconsidered over an extended period."
"If we asked a roomful of teachers how often they practiced what they did in the 'game,' that is how often they rehearsed the questions they'd ask or the way they'd start class, most would look at us funny," the authors say. "Teachers listen, reflect, discuss and debate, but not practice."
The authors learned this only recently after analyzing the results of a study of great teachers in high-poverty public schools, reported in Lemov's previous best-selling book, "Teach Like a Champion." The teachers with the best results "were often the most likely to focus on small and seemingly mundane aspects of their daily work." The authors liken this to legendary basketball coach John Wooden, who went so far as to teach players how to put their socks on correctly. But the insight did not immediately illumine the importance of practice.
As part of the Uncommon Schools charter school network, the authors began to train their teachers with video clips of skilled instructors performing a given technique. The trainees discussed and analyzed until they were sure they understood it, then moved on to the next technique. They left the class full of confidence, but when surveyed three months later were not so sure. Something often went wrong when they tried the techniques in class.
The authors realized their trainees hadn't practiced. It was the equivalent of trying to learn a new backhand in the middle of a match at Wimbledon's Centre Court.
They added repetitive exercises to their training workshops. Teachers played students so the situation would resemble a real classroom. Teachers still had trouble getting it right. The real-world situation was too distracting; the authors dialed down the student disruption so their trainees had a chance to do the technique correctly several times. Once it became automatic, they could handle unpredictable moments.
In their real classrooms the new skills began to work. Teachers not only implemented the techniques but also began to innovate and adapt them in new ways. The authors know this because they made and studied videos of the teachers at work, one of their favorite tools.
In the future, schools will still often spend big money on training teachers in ineffective ways. Learning to practice, this book vividly illustrates, takes time and effort, trial and error. It won't happen tomorrow. But even a small movement in the direction of more practice will reap benefits, in teaching and many other things we do.
For previous columns, go to washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle.


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Viewers of the three presidential debates have noted that, more so than in past election cycles, President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney seem to have a real dislike for one another.
Obama tried to put that speculation to rest this week, telling NBC News' anchor Brian Williams that the animosity between the two candidates is similar to that we have seen in past presidential campaigns where the two candidates were well acquainted.
"You can't say that you've got a real relationship there," Obama told Williams in an interview that aired Wednesday night. "I don't think that [there's] any relationship between me and Mitt Romney that's different from previous presidential campaigns. I mean, John McCain I knew, because I had served with him in the Senate. But I think if you look at George Bush and John Kerry or George Bush and Al Gore or first President Bush and Bill Clinton, I don't think anybody would say that while you were in the middle of a campaign that you felt deep affection for the other guy."
"I think the American people understand that this is not about two individuals or even two political parties," Obama added. "This is about two different visions for the country and how we are going to make sure that every single person in America who is willing to work hard is going to have a shot at a better life."
Watch the interview below, courtesy of NBC News:
Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy


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What's more, the area of track where the train derailed is one deemed by the MTA as a "critical break area," and is the site of the second-highest rate of rail breakage between 2005 and 2012 with 205 broken rails. The MTA had plans to reinforce this trouble spot in a project planned for 2015 rollout, according to published reports.
The incident occurred at 10:25 a.m., leaving the roughly 1,000 passengers to swelter in the stuffy, powerless train for almost an hour before rescue workers were able to safely assist them out onto the street through an emergency hatch at the corner of 60th Street and Broadway.
At a press conference shortly after the derailment, Thomas Prendergast, chairman and CEO of the MTA, said that the main concern going into the weekend was reestablishing local service, after which they would focus on removing the train.
"Focus initially was on taking are of all the injured," Prendergast said. "Now we're going to focus on the investigation. The accident needs to be looked at very closely."
Chief Leonard of the FDNY explained that the middle six of the eight cars in the train carrying approximately 1,000 passengers were affected by the derailment. Originally, smoke was reported, however Leonard confirmed that this was in fact dust, and no fires were caused by the derailment.
There were 19 injuries reported in the accident, most related to trouble breathing and chest pains, according to FDNY spokesman James Long after the press conference.
"Any ventilation down there was turned off so it was hot for people down there," said Leonard. "It was dark. There was no emergency lights and no power."
Counciilman Jimmy Van Bramer rushed to the scene as soon as he was able to confirm what had taken place.
"My office is not too far away and we could hear the helicopters all over Sunnyside and Woodside. We rushed over to see what the situation was and to make sure all the appropriate agencies were here," Van Bramer said. "They were, they are and we are very pleased with the response."
He said his office plans to follow the investigation closely and to ensure that the people of Queens have restored express service as soon as possible.
"Obviously we want to follow the investigation and see how we can both begin the investigation, make sure everyone is safe, and ultimately get service back up and running for people of Western Queens; the F train is an important train everyone here," Van Bramer said.
Prior to the F train derailment on Friday, the last subway derailment was on May 29th at 125th Street on the 1 line.


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JustUnfollow: Get Sweet, Sweet Revenge on Tweeps — App of the Day
If you are Neil Patrick Harris, you don't care who unfollows you on Twitter. If you are a normal person, though, you probably do want to know what jerk gave you a Twitter-ized "it's not you, it's me." Clearly you need the app JustUnfollow to stalk all those tweeps who reject you.
JustUnfollow, by Codigami Inc., allows you to keep track of Twitterers who unfollow you, plus those you follow but don't return the favor. You may do with this knowledge as you will—but remember that revenge is not always the answer. (Just a majority of the time.)
- Enables you to follow and unfollow those who unfollow you, as well as those whom you follow but do not follow you back
- Allows you to track those who follow you, so you can follow them back
- Gives you Whitelist (Twitter accounts you may want to follow) and Blacklist (those Twitter accounts you probably don't want to follow) options
- Lets you to manage multiple Twitter accounts from a single place
- Available in a free version
- The amount of users you can unfollow on the free version is limited to 50 people
- Doesn't link with other Twitter-related sites like Instagram
- The upgrades are pricey and time-limited: the Premium version is $4.99 for one year of unlimited access for one Twitter account; the Pro version is $24.99 for one year of unlimited access for five Twitter accounts; and both the Pro and Premium versions allow you to White- and Blacklist up to 10,000 Twitter users
The free version of JustUnfollow is a great way to manage your Twitter. It also allows you to feed your vindictive soul. However, the Premium and Pro versions are rather expensive for what they offer. In the end, stick with the free version—cattiness should be indulged only so much.
JustUnfollow is available to download for Android platforms. For more information on the app and how to download, click here.


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Everett-Bellingham WA
When do you call a lawyer?
It's one of the hardest times in life – after a debilitating accident. No one wants to be in this situation, but what if you are? You don't have to go it alone. Because negotiating with the insurance company to try to get your bills covered just as your policy should be designed to do, can feel like David phoning up Goliath to try to make a deal. There are personal injury attorneys who spend years specializing in these kinds of situations. Sometimes all it takes is having one represent you to start a process in motion that would lead to a very different outcome than if you were to try to work with insurers yourself. For a list of questions to help you decide if an attorney can help you, click here.


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I want add 12 sounds in vb6. I dont know how and what components to use. Then when i do manage add the sounds i need eacht of sound play once depending of program answer. For example:
I create 1 CSom button and SDtade button is zodiac answer.
Can anyone help me?Code:If SDate.Caption = "Aries" Then CSom. play aries.midi end if If SDate.Caption = "Taurus" Then CSom. play taurus.midi end if


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I am ripping of the title of a well known book for this post clearly but something happened at the end of last week that truly amazed me.
I had, through a reputable magazine, seen an article promoting a tailoring event in London along Savile Row hosted by a relatively new company to the row. I won't mention names as that is bad manners and am not out to damage their excellent reputation rather make aware to any that follow in their footsteps how you can become a sad and fearful boss or figure rather than inspiration to others.
Back to the article. It read that this event is free and open to all that wished to join. All I had to do was register online and would be welcome.
So I did and was helped wonderfully by the magazine. I registered with my personal email as was not on company business, remember I am in the same line of business as the company I am talking about. The visiting tailoring business.
To be honest, the reason I had wanted to go was I had read a lot about these chaps and the success they had and kind of wanted to get to meet them and hear what expert knowledge they could impart.
My registration was paused as they couldn't take a personal email for the event and must have a company name in. So I sent my work one.
Silly me, I though that meant it was a trade event and that must mean other tailors would appear. I was wrong but was my thought process so was even more excited to meet lots of different chaps in the industry and talk shop over a glass of champers.
I was accepted and even went on to ask if I could bring a date. Yes was the answer from the mag. No was the answer from my wife when I asked if she wanted to go as she had studying to do for a test. So I invited one of my work colleagues who I knew knew the owners personally.
He thought it would be a great idea and evening to boot. I had been looking forward to all week, as I rarely get some me time being a dad of a little one, and a good mate was joining me to go. Even better.
So we arrived, talking about what it was going to be like.
We ascended the Savile Row office steps and then further up to the first floor and entered what seem to be a event in full swing. Well dressed gentlemen and ladies were everywhere and photographers were dotted around (Karl Lagerfeld was opening the new Regent Street Chanel shop round the corner so most photojourns were there).
My colleague and I immediately made for the owners to say hi from him and introduce my self from me.
Not for an instance did I expect the reaction we got. It wasn't angry or furious or anything that terrible. He just said (and I do appreciate I am paraphrasing but apswaer blind it is as close to the true gist of it as can remember):
HIM "I don't think its fair that you have come here tonight."
US "Huh? What do you mean?"
HIM "I don't think its right you have come. I imagine it would be an unspoken rule to not turn up here." (because we were from another visiting tailoring company I assumed correctly)
US "Why? What's wrong with us being here? We're not here to try and steal your clients."
HIM "Well, I can't force you to leave so stay if you really must but I do think it's unfair."
(there were 10 or so people directly around us but felt that if we were only he would have walked us to the door himself)
I tried to explain my reasons for coming as both me and my colleague love tailoring and fine fitting clothing and had wanted to enjoy an evening hosted by two guys who have made some great success for themselves. Eager to learn always.
He still felt we were crossing some awful line that we should have seen. So, we politely left, clearly not wanted and basically kicked out for whatever reason. I can only imagine it was fear. Fear of us stealing clients (nothing would ever tempt us to reveal we were from a rival company to their clients let alone try to steal them. And we had gone straight up to them to introduce ourselves or say hi in my colleagues case. Theives don't operate so), fear of us learning something about their business, fear of....i know not what.
It was sad more than anything. I hope when I am succesful to that degree I won't operate out of fear and uneeded secrecy from people in the business. Or anyone for that matter.
So there, that was my thursday night event.
My colleague was livid and took a while for the smoke to stop emitting from his ears. We ended up for a quick drink at a wonderful jazz and blues bar nearby where we had, we felt, a much better time than we would have had at the tailoring event.
We didn't get slammed. We left by 8pm. But my colleague did bump into an old friend and his friends grilfriend so we chatted with them whilst a live band played a foot away from our heads.
I even bumped into a very happy client who just happened to be there that night and his delightful partner who complimented me on my work for his first suit.
So thanks to those that deserve and a shameful shake of the head to the owners. Hope you think better of your business brothers in the furture guys.


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Monday, May 26, 2008
Run for Ryan - Memorial Day Race
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 6:28 PM 4 comments
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Graduation Week!!!
Here we are getting Libby ready for her graduation.
Liberty getting excited. The whole class was antsy!
Here is Liberty and her class just before they walked out to graduate! So cute. Note: check out the kitchen in the background...that is what I get to work in everyday! Nice huh!
On Friday morning we had Caleb's Sixth Grade Graduation. He woke up and got dressed and I honestly had a hard time looking at him, he looked so grown up. This graduation was very simple and nice. Caleb and all the graduates looked very nice and I can remember most of them from Kindergarten and all other grades while helping in the classes. They had to wear these dorky hats, no offense to the one who planned it because the hats fit the theme of the graduation. But check them out! Half of them didn't even fit the kids heads. The theme was "Around the World in 1,246 days" from Kindergarten to Sixth grade. They had all kinds of travel things around the gym and all the sixth graders just completed a country report and they had all the posters from the oral reports hanging up. It was cute. But the hats had to go!
Grammy & Papa were able to come to support Caleb.
Caleb standing next to his country report...which he got a 100% plus on it. Nice Job!
Here he is getting his diploma...notice the cute hat!
Here we are...look how tall our boy is getting. Yikes!
Congratulations Graduates!!!
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 12:24 PM 1 comments
Friday, May 16, 2008
Mother's Day Fun!
My family room is starting to take shape! I love my couch and coffee table!
(Little note about the couch...Craig and I figured that after 13 years of marriage, it was time that we bought something new! All of our furniture up to this point has been hand-me-down. Not that I am against hand-me-downs at all...but we really needed a new couch. I finally got my leather sectional. I love it! )
Like I said, this one will never be forgotten! I love the cup! It all makes me laugh!
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 8:45 PM 3 comments
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Quick Post
Okay, I have so much to blog about but that will have to wait. Our cute photographer posted the rest of our photos. I must say that family photos really make you pick yourself apart. Be honest who do you look at first in a group photo. Well if you are me...it's ME of course. I will say that I love the photos of the kids, but it is hard for me to pick one of the family because of me. I just will have to examine them more before I come up with a winner. Check them out and see what you think. Just as a side note, this has nothing to do with the photographer, I am just being critical to myself. Let me know which you would pick.
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 7:41 PM 5 comments
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Gymnastics Recital
Liberty had her Gymnastics Recital on Saturday morning. She looked so cute in her new gymnastics suit as she calls them. They did two cute little dance routines and then they each went around the gym and performed in each event. She did front rolls, cart wheels, the vault, the bars and the beam. She did a great job! Somehow she slipped off the bars and fell, she did cry but pulled it all together and went on with her performance. She loves gymnastics and I must say that little girl is getting quite the muscular body from doing it for 2 years already. Keep up the good work Liberty!
Liberty hanging out and waiting her turn!Liberty showing off her medal! So cute!
Liberty and her cute coaches!
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 8:55 PM 5 comments
We Love our Wii!
You got it High School Musical Sing Along!!! I knew right off the bat Liberty would be hooked. She knows like every word to every song from both movies and so do the boys. She was the first to play and quickly the boys were begging to have a turn. Well, all of them loved playing. It was so funny! Craig and I were laughing so hard at how into it they all got. Check out the photos and you will get my drift. If you are ever in the mood for a great laugh you must come over and play/sing with us. By the way, I took a turn and got an A grade. (each person is graded on how well they sang the song) Liberty actually got an A plus. She totally stole my thunder!
You can even see the attitude from the back.
Zach totally got into it!
Look at all the feeling he is putting into it! I love it!
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 8:33 PM 1 comments
A little bit about the photographer
I highly recommend her! She was so cute! She books up really fast. If you are interested call soon. Tell her I sent you her way...she has this little deal for every referral you give her she rewards you with some free prints or something like that. But really all that aside, she is worth every penny. Loved her!!! Her business info is on her other blog...
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 3:26 PM 0 comments
Monday, May 5, 2008
Fun Family Photos
Okay, so we went on Saturday to have our family photos taken. It was a blast. The kids loved it and we all had a great time. We went to Wheeler Farm and met the cutest photographer ever! She was so awesome. I haven't gotten all the photos back yet, but you can get a glimpse of them on her blog...
Posted by Craig and Cricket at 8:16 PM 9 comments


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Charles Shaw Shiraz California 2005
Winemaker's Notes:
Lovingly nicknamed "Two Buck Chuck" by a member of the wine press, these California wines have become something of a phenomenon in the wine world, and in our stores. Contrary to many an urban legend, these super-value wines began as the result of an oversupply of wine and a great relationship with a valued supplier. They've become the nation's best-selling wines, not surprising when you consider the combination of low price ($1.99 - $3.49 per bottle, depending on the region) and great taste Charles Shaw wines offer. Depending on the season and the quality of wine available, our selection of Charles Shaw varietals will vary, but the quality never will
Member Reviews for Charles Shaw Shiraz CaliforniaAdd your review
Great value, awesome everyday red, full of flavor, great with steak and other meats,
Obviously not the best Shiraz I've ever tasted, but for $3, an incredible value.
have had better under $10 shiraz
Three glasses
Food Pairings for Charles Shaw Shiraz California
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