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The Balkan Peninsula, popularly referred to as the Balkans, is a geographical region of Southeast Europe.[1] The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch from the east of Serbia to the Black Sea at the east of Bulgaria. The Balkans are generally considered to include, in whole or in part, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo,[a] the Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia, and the European part of Turkey.[2]
The region is inhabited by Albanians, Bulgarians, Bosniaks, Croats, Gorani, Greeks, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Serbs, Slovenes, Romanians, Aromanians, Turks, and other ethnic groups which present minorities in certain countries like the Romani and Ashkali.[2] The largest religion on the Balkans is Orthodox Christianity, followed by Catholic Christianity and Islam.[3]
The total area of the Balkans is 666,700 square km (257,400 square miles) and the population is 59,297,000 (est. 2002).[2] The Balkans meets the Adriatic Sea on the northwest, Ionian Sea on the southwest, the Mediterranean and Aegean Sea on the south and southeast, and the Black Sea on the east and northeast. The highest point of the Balkans is mount Musala Script error: No such module "convert". on the Rila mountain range in Bulgaria.
The Balkans have been inhabited since the Paleolithic and are the route by which farming from the Middle East spread to Europe during the Neolithic (7th millennium BC).[4][5] The Balkans are also the location of Europe's first advanced civilizations, beginning with the Bronze Age in Greece around 3200 BC.[6]
- 1 Name
- 2 Definitions and boundaries
- 3 Nature and natural resources
- 4 History and geopolitical significance
- 5 Politics and economy
- 6 Demographics
- 7 Culture
- 8 See also
- 9 Annotations
- 10 References
- 11 Sources
- 12 External links
Classical Antiquity
The region was referred to in Greek and Roman sources as the "Peninsula of Haemus". The mountain range itself was known as the "Haemus Mountains", the name being of possibly Thracian etymology.[7] Other possible etymology for "Haemus" (Αἵμος) comes from the Greek mythology. 'Haemus', still being used in Modern Greek, derives from the Greek word "haema" (αἵμα) meaning 'blood'. The myth goes about the fight of Zeus and the monster/titan Typhon. Zeus injured Typhon with a thunder bolt and Typhon's blood fell on the mountains from which they got their name.[8]
Early Middle Ages
The name Balkan is believed to be brought to the region in the 7th century by the Bulgars who applied it to the area, as a part of their First Bulgarian Empire.[9] In Bulgarian language the word balkan (балкан) means "mountain".[10] At this time the name Balkan may have derived to Bulgarian from the Persian bālkāneh or bālākhāna, meaning "high, above, or proud house."[11] The name is still preserved in Central Asia with the Balkan Daglary (Balkan Mountains)[12] and the Balkan Province of Turkmenistan.
Middle Ages
During the Ottoman rule of the area the name Balkan was used, as in Turkish it means "a chain of wooded mountains" (balkan).[13][14] It was also used in the general meaning of mountain, as in Kod̲j̲a-Balkan, Čatal-Balkan, and Ungurus-Balkani̊, but especially it was applied to the Haemus mountain.[15] In this period the name Balkan was first documented.[9]
On a larger scale, the mountains are only one part of a long continuous chain crossing the region in the form of a reversed letter S, from the Carpathians south to the Balkan range proper, before marching away east into Turkey. The Balkan Mountains include the Stara Planina (Old Mountain) mountain range in Bulgaria and part of Serbia. On the west coast, an offshoot of the Dinaric Alps follows the coast south through Dalmatia and Albania, crosses Greece, and continues into the sea in the form of islands.
In the languages of the region, the peninsula is known as:
- Slavic languages:
- Bulgarian: Балкански полуостров, transliterated: Balkanski poluostrov
- Macedonian: Балкански Полуостров, transliterated: Balkanski Poluostrov
- Serbo-Croatian: Балканско полуострво/Balkansko poluostrvo (Serbian and Bosnian), Balkanski poluotok (Croatian), Balkansko Poluostrvo/Балканско полуострво (Montenegrin)
- Slovene: Balkanski polotok
- Latin languages:
- Albanian: Gadishulli Ballkanik and Siujdhesa e Ballkanit
- Greek: Βαλκανική χερσόνησος, transliterated: Valkaniki hersonisos
- Turkish: Balkan Yarımadası (or alternatively: Balkanlar)
Evolution of meaning
The first attested time the name "Balkan" was used in the West for the mountain range in Bulgaria was in a letter sent in 1490 to Pope Innocent VIII by Buonaccorsi Callimaco, an Italian humanist, writer and diplomat.[16] English traveler John Morritt introduced this term into the English literature at the end of the 18th century, and other authors started applying the name to the wider area between the Adriatic and the Black Sea. The concept of the "Balkans" was created by the German geographer August Zeune in 1808.[17] During the 1820s, "Balkan became the preferred although not yet exclusive term alongside Haemus among British travelers... Among Russian travelers not so burdened by classical toponymy, Balkan was the preferred term."[18]
As time passed, the term gradually acquired political connotations far from its initial geographic meaning, arising from political changes from the late 19th century to the creation of post–World War I Yugoslavia (initially the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes). Zeune's goal was to have a geographical parallel term to the Italic and Iberian Peninsula, and seemingly nothing more. The gradually acquired political connotations are newer and, to a large extent, due to oscillating political circumstances.
After the dissolution of Yugoslavia beginning in June 1991, the term "Balkans" again received a negative meaning, even in casual usage (see Balkanization).
Southeast Europe
In part due to the historical and political connotations of the term "Balkans",[19] especially since the military conflicts of the 1990s, the term "Southeast Europe" is becoming increasingly popular even though it literally refers to a much larger area and thus isn't as precise.[20] A European Union initiative of 1999 is called the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe, and the online newspaper Balkan Times renamed itself Southeast European Times in 2003.
Definitions and boundaries
The Balkan Peninsula
The Balkan Peninsula is an area of southeastern Europe surrounded by water on three sides: the Adriatic Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea (including the Ionian and Aegean seas) and the Marmara Sea to the south and the Black Sea to the east. Its northern boundary is often given as the Danube, Sava and Kupa Rivers.[21][22] The Balkan Peninsula has a combined area of about Script error: No such module "convert". (slightly smaller than Spain).
Countries whose territories lie mostly within the Balkan peninsula:
- 23x15px Albania
- 23x15px Bosnia and Herzegovina
- 23x15px Croatia (larger part in the Balkans, smaller in Central Europe)
- 23x15px Bulgaria
- 23x15px Greece (mainland and some islands in the Balkans, some islands in Western Asia)
- 23x15px Kosovo
- 23x15px Macedonia
- 23x15px Montenegro
- 23x15px Serbia (larger part in the Balkans, smaller in Central Europe)
Countries that lie partially within the Balkan peninsula:
- 23x15px Romania (Smaller part, commonly placed in Eastern Europe or Southeast Europe)
- 23x15px Turkey (Smaller part, commonly placed in Western Asia or Southeast Europe)[citation needed]
- 23x15px Italy (Minor part, placed in South Europe)
- 23x15px Slovenia (Minor part, placed in Central Europe)
As of 1920 until World War II Italy included Istria and some Dalmatian areas (like Zara, known as Zadar) that are within the general definition of the Balkan peninsula. The current territory of Italy includes only the small area around Trieste and Gorizia inside the Balkan Peninsula. However, the regions of Trieste and Istria are not usually considered part of the Balkans by Italian geographers, due to a definition of the Balkans that limits its western border to the Kupa River.[23]
The Balkans
The abstracted term "The Balkans" covers those countries which lie within the boundaries of the Balkan Peninsula.[21] Before 1991, the whole of Yugoslavia was considered to be part of the Balkans.[24] The term "The Balkans" is sometimes used to describe only the areas in the Balkan peninsula: Moesia, Macedonia, Thrace, Kosovo, Šumadija, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Thessaly, Epirus, Peloponnese and others, but often it includes Croatia, Serbia and Romania,[21] namely the provinces of Vojvodina, Banat, Wallachia, Moldavia, Transylvania, and others. Italy as a totality is generally accepted as part of Western Europe and the Apennines. The term "the Balkans" was coined by August Zeune in 1808.
Broadly interpreted, the term Balkans comprise the following territories:[25]
- 23x15px Albania (28,748 km2)
- 23x15px Bosnia and Herzegovina (51,197 km2)
- 23x15px Bulgaria (110,993 km2)
- 23x15px Croatia (56,594 km2)
- 23x15px Greece (131,990 km2)
- 23x15px Kosovo (10,908 km2)
- 23x15px Macedonia (25,713 km2)
- 23x15px Montenegro (13,812 km2)
- 23x15px Romania (238,391 km2)
- 23x15px Slovenia (20,273 km2)
- 23x15px Serbia (77,474 km2)
- 23x15px Turkey (23,764 km2)
Western Balkans
Some institutions[citation needed] and member states of the European Union have defined the "Western Balkans" as the south-east European area that includes countries that are not members of the European Union, while others refer to the geographical aspects. The Western Balkans is a neologism coined to describe the countries of "ex-Yugoslavia (minus Slovenia) and Albania".[26] Countries of the western Balkans are Croatia (now an EU member), Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia and Albania — or Albania plus the former Yugoslavia, minus Slovenia.[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34] Each of these countries aims to join the EU and reach democracy and transmission scores but, until then, they will be strongly connected with the pre-EU waiting program CEFTA.[35]
Nature and natural resources
Most of the area is covered by mountain ranges running from north-west to south-east. The main ranges are the Balkan mountains, running from the Black Sea Coast in Bulgaria to its border with Serbia, the Rhodope mountains in southern Bulgaria and northern Greece, the Dinaric Alps in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Montenegro, the Šar massif which spreads from Albania to Macedonia, and the Pindus range, spanning from southern Albania into central Greece and the Albanian Alps. The highest mountain of the region is Rila in Bulgaria, with Musala at 2925 m, Mount Olympus in Greece, the throne of Zeus, being second at 2917 m and Vihren in Bulgaria being the third at 2914 m. The karst field or polje is a common feature of the landscape.
On the Adriatic and Aegean coasts the climate is Mediterranean, on the Black Sea coast the climate is humid subtropical and oceanic, and inland it is humid continental. In the northern part of the peninsula and on the mountains, winters are frosty and snowy, while summers are hot and dry. In the southern part winters are milder. The humid continental climate is predominant in Bosnia and Herzegovina, northern Croatia, Bulgaria, Kosovo, Macedonia, northern Montenegro, the interior of Albania, Romania and Serbia, while the other, less common climates, the humid subtropical and oceanic climates, are seen on the Black Sea coast of Bulgaria and Turkey; and the Mediterranean climate is seen on the coast of Albania, coast of Croatia, Greece, southern Montenegro and the Aegean coast of Turkey.
During the centuries many woods have been cut down and replaced with bush. In the southern part and on the coast there is evergreen vegetation. Inland there are woods typical of Central Europe (oak and beech, and in the mountains, spruce, fir and pine). The tree line in the mountains lies at the height of 1800–2300 m. The landscape provides habitats for numerous endemic species, including extraordinarily abundant insects and reptiles that serve as food for a variety of birds of prey and rare vultures.
The soils are generally poor, except on the plains where areas with natural grass, fertile soils and warm summers provide an opportunity for tillage. Elsewhere, land cultivation is mostly unsuccessful because of the mountains, hot summers and poor soils, although certain cultures such as olives and grapes flourish.
Resources of energy are scarce, except in the territory of Kosovo, where considerable coal, lead, zinc, chromium, silver deposits are located.[36] Other deposits of coal, especially in Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Bosnia also exist. Lignite deposits are widespread in Greece. Petroleum is most notably present in Romania, although scarce reserves exist in Greece, Serbia and Albania. Natural gas deposits are scarce. Hydropower is in wide use, with over 1,000 dams. The often relentless bora wind is also being harnessed for power generation.
Metal ores are more usual than other raw materials. Iron ore is rare but in some countries there is a considerable amount of copper, zinc, tin, chromite, manganese, magnesite and bauxite. Some metals are exported.
The time zones are situated as follows:
- Territories in the time zone of UTC+01:00: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia
- Territories in the time zone of UTC+02:00: Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Turkey
History and geopolitical significance
The Balkan region was the first area of Europe to experience the arrival of farming cultures in the Neolithic era. The practices of growing grain and raising livestock arrived in the Balkans from the Fertile Crescent by way of Anatolia and spread west and north into Pannonia and Central Europe.
The identity of the Balkans is dominated by its geographical position; historically the area was known as a crossroads of cultures. It has been a juncture between the Latin and Greek bodies of the Roman Empire,[citation needed] the destination of a massive influx of pagan Bulgars and Slavs, an area where Orthodox and Catholic Christianity met,[37] as well as the meeting point between Islam and Christianity.
In pre-classical and classical antiquity, this region was home to Greeks, Illyrians, Paeonians, Thracians, Dacians, and other ancient groups. The Achaemenid Persian Empire incorporated parts of the Balkans comprising Macedonia, Thrace, Bulgaria, and the Black Sea coastal region of Romania between the late 6th and the first half of the 5th century BC into its territories.[38] Later the Roman Empire conquered most of the region and spread Roman culture and the Latin language, but significant parts still remained under classical Greek influence. The Romans considered the Rhodope Mountains to be the northern limit of the Peninsula of Haemus and the same limit applied approximately to the border between Greek and Latin use in the region (later called the Jireček Line).[39] The Bulgars and Slavs arrived in the 6th century and began assimilating and displacing already-assimilated (through Romanization and Hellenization) older inhabitants of the northern and central Balkans, forming the Bulgarian Empire.[40] During the Middle Ages, the Balkans became the stage for a series of wars between the Byzantine Roman and the Bulgarian Empires.
Early modern period
By the end of the 16th century, the Ottoman Empire had become the controlling force in the region after expanding from Anatolia through Thrace to the Balkans. Many people in the Balkans place their greatest folk heroes in the era of either the onslaught or the retreat of the Ottoman Empire.[citation needed] As examples, for Greeks, Constantine XI Palaiologos and Kolokotronis; and for Serbs, Miloš Obilić and Tzar Lazar; for Montenegrins, Đurađ I Balšić and Ivan Crnojević; for Albanians, George Kastrioti Skanderbeg; for ethnic Macedonians, Nikola Karev[41] and Goce Delčev;[41] and for Bulgarians, Vasil Levski, Georgi Sava Rakovski and Hristo Botev.
In the past several centuries, because of the frequent Ottoman wars in Europe fought in and around the Balkans and the comparative Ottoman isolation from the mainstream of economic advance (reflecting the shift of Europe's commercial and political centre of gravity towards the Atlantic), the Balkans has been the least developed part of Europe. According to Suraiya Faroqhi and Donald Quataert, "The population of the Balkans, according to one estimate, fell from a high of 8 million in the late 16th century to only 3 million by the mid-eighteenth. This estimate is in harmony with the first findings based on Ottoman documentary evidence."[42]
Most of the Balkan nation-states emerged during the 19th and early 20th centuries as they gained independence from the Ottoman Empire or the Austro-Hungarian empire (Greece in 1821, Serbia, Montenegro and Romania in 1878, Bulgaria in 1908, Albania in 1912).
20th century
World wars
In 1912–1913 the First Balkan War broke out when the nation-states of Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Montenegro united in an alliance against the Ottoman Empire. As a result of the war, almost all remaining European territories of the Ottoman Empire were captured and partitioned among the allies. Ensuing events also led to the creation of an independent Albanian state. Bulgaria insisted on its status quo territorial integrity, divided and shared by the Great Powers next to the Russo-Turkish War (1877–78) in other boundaries and on the pre-war Bulgarian-Serbian agreement. Provoked by the backstage deals between its former allies Serbia and Greece on allocation the spoils at the end of the First Balkan War, while it fights at the main Thracian Front, Bulgaria marks the beginning of Second Balkan War when attacked them. The Serbs and the Greeks repulse single attacks, but when the Greek army invaded Bulgaria together with an unprovoked Romanian intervention in the back, regardless of the single won battles, Bulgaria collapsed. The Ottoman Empire also used the opportunity to recapture Eastern Thrace, establishing its new western borders that still stand today.
The First World War was sparked in the Balkans in 1914 when Mlada Bosna, a revolutionary organization with predominately Serbian and pro-Yugoslav members, assassinated the Austro-Hungarian heir Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Bosnia and Herzegovina's capital, Sarajevo. That caused a war between the two countries which—through the existing chains of alliances—led to the First World War. The Ottoman Empire soon joined the Central Powers becoming one of the three empires participating in that alliance. The next year Bulgaria joined the Central Powers attacking Serbia, which was successfully fighting Austro-Hungary to the north for a year. That led to Serbia's defeat and the intervention of the Entente in the Balkans which sent an expeditionary force to establish a new front, the third one of that war, which soon also became static. The participation of Greece in the war three years later, in 1918, on the part of the Entente finally altered the balance between the opponents leading to the collapse of the common German-Bulgarian front there, which caused the exit of Bulgaria from the war, and in turn the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, ending the First World War.[43]
With the start of the Second World War all Balkan countries, with the exception of Greece, were allies of Nazi Germany, having bilateral military agreements or being part of the Axis Pact. Fascist Italy expanded the war in the Balkans by using its protectorate Albania to invade Greece. After repelling the attack, the Greeks counterattacked, invading Italy-held Albania and causing Nazi Germany's intervention in the Balkans to help its ally.[44] Days before the German invasion a successful coup d'état in Belgrade by neutral military personnel seized power.[45]
Although the new government reaffirmed Serbia's intentions to fulfill its obligations as member of the Axis,[46] Germany, using its other two allied countries in the region, Bulgaria and Hungary, invaded both Greece and Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia immediately disintegrated when those loyal to the Serbian King and the Croatian units mutinied.[47] Greece resisted, but, after two months of fighting, collapsed and was occupied. The two countries were partitioned between the three Axis allies, Bulgaria, Germany and Italy, and the Independent State of Croatia, a puppet state of Italy and Germany.
During the occupation the population suffered considerable hardship due to repression and starvation, to which the population reacted by creating a mass resistance movement.[48] Together with the early and extremely heavy winter of that year (which caused hundreds of thousands deaths among the poorly fed population), the German invasion had disastrous effects in the timetable of the planned invasion in Russia causing a significant delay,[49] which had major consequences during the course of the war.[50]
Finally, at the end of 1944, the Soviets entered Romania and Bulgaria forcing the Germans out of the Balkans. They left behind a region largely ruined as a result of wartime exploitation, but by making use of the post-war separation of Germany into two independent entities, the German states successfully and legally avoided paying any reparations or repaying the forced loans given by the occupied countries.
Cold War
During the Cold War, most of the countries on the Balkans were governed by communist governments. Greece became the first battleground of the emerging Cold War. The Truman Doctrine was the US response to the civil war, which raged from 1944 to 1949. This civil war, unleashed by the Communist Party of Greece, backed by communist volunteers from neighboring countries (Albania, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia), led to massive American assistance for the non-communist Greek government. With this backing, Greece managed to defeat the partisans and, ultimately, remained the only non-communist country in the region.
However, despite being under communist governments, Yugoslavia (1948) and Albania (1961) fell out with the Soviet Union. Yugoslavia, led by Marshal Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980), first propped up then rejected the idea of merging with Bulgaria and instead sought closer relations with the West, later even spearheaded, together with India and Egypt the Non-Aligned Movement. Albania on the other hand gravitated toward Communist China, later adopting an isolationist position.
As the only non-communist countries, Greece and Turkey were (and still are) part of NATO composing the southeastern wing of the alliance.
Post–Cold War
In the 1990s, the transition of the regions' ex-Soviet bloc countries towards democratic free-market societies went peacefully with the exception of Yugoslavia. Wars between the former Yugoslav republics broke out after Slovenia and Croatia held free elections and their people voted for independence on their respective countries' referenda. Serbia in turn declared the dissolution of the union as unconstitutional and the Yugoslavian army unsuccessfully tried to maintain status quo. Slovenia and Croatia declared independence on 25 June 1991, followed by the Ten-Day War in Slovenia. Till October 1991, the Army withdrew from Slovenia, and in Croatia, the Croatian War of Independence would continue until 1995. In the ensuing 10 years armed confrontation, gradually all the other Republics declared independence, with Bosnia being the most affected by the fighting. The long lasting wars resulted in a United Nations intervention and NATO ground and air forces took action against Serb forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.
From the dissolution of Yugoslavia six republics achieved international recognition as sovereign republics, but these are traditionally included in Balkans: Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia. In 2008, while under UN administration, Kosovo declared independence (according to the official Serbian policy, Kosovo is still an internal autonomous region). In July 2010, the International Court of Justice, ruled that the declaration of independence was legal.[51] Most UN member states recognise Kosovo. After the end of the wars a revolution broke in Serbia and Slobodan Milošević, the Serbian communist leader (elected president between 1989 and 2000), was overthrown and handed for trial to the International Criminal Tribunal for crimes against the International Humanitarian Law during the Yugoslav wars. Milošević died of a heart attack in 2006 before a verdict could have been released. Ιn 2001 an Albanian uprising in Macedonia forced the country to give local autonomy to the ethnic Albanians in the areas where they predominate.
With the dissolution of Yugoslavia an issue emerged over the name under which the former (federated) republic of Macedonia would internationally be recognized, between the new country and Greece. Being the Macedonian part of Yugoslavia (see Vardar Macedonia), the federated Republic under the Yugoslav identity had the name Republic of Macedonia on which it declared its sovereignty in 1991. Greece, having a large region (see Macedonia) also under the same name opposed to the usage of this name as an indication of a nationality. The issue is currently under negotiations after a UN initiation.
Balkan countries control the direct land routes between Western Europe and South West Asia (Asia Minor and the Middle East). Since 2000, all Balkan countries are friendly towards the EU and the USA.[citation needed]
Greece has been a member of the European Union since 1981 while Bulgaria and Romania are members since 2007. In 2005, the European Union decided to start accession negotiations with candidate countries; Turkey, and Macedonia were accepted as candidates for European Union membership. In March 2004, Bulgaria and Romania have become members of NATO. As of April 2009,[52] Albania is a member of NATO. Bosnia and Herzegovina and what was then Serbia and Montenegro started negotiations with the EU over the Stabilization and Accession Agreements, although shortly after they started, negotiations with Serbia and Montenegro were suspended for lack of co-operation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. During the 2008 Bucharest summit Greece vetoed Macedonia's NATO membership bid over the Macedonia naming dispute between the two countries[citation needed].
All other countries have expressed a desire to join the EU at some point in the future.
Politics and economy
Currently all of the states are republics, but until World War II all except Turkey were monarchies. Most of the republics are parliamentary, excluding Romania and Bosnia which are semi-presidential. All the states have open market economies, most of which are in the upper-middle income range ($4,000 – $12,000 p.c.), however, Greece has high income economies (over $12,000 p.c.), and is also classified with very high HDI in contrast to the remaining states which are classified with high HDI. The states from the former Eastern Bloc that formerly had planned economy system and Turkey mark gradual economic growth each year, only the economy of Greece drops for 2012 and meanwhile it was expected to grow in 2013. The Gross domestic product (Purchasing power parity) per capita is highest in Greece (over $25), followed by Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Montenegro, Serbia, Macedonia ($10 – $15), Bosnia, Albania and Kosovo (below $10).[53] The Gini coefficient, which indicates the level of difference by monetary welfare of the layers, is on the second level at the highest monetary equality in Albania, Bulgaria and Serbia, on the third level in Greece, Montenegro and Romania, on the fourth level in Macedonia, on the fifth level in Turkey, and the most unequal by Gini coefficient is Bosnia at the eighth level which is the penultimate level and one of the highest in the world. The unemployment is lowest in Romania (below 10%), followed by Bulgaria, Turkey, Albania (10 – 15%), Greece (15 – 20%), Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia (20 – 30%), Macedonia (over 30%) and Kosovo (over 40%).
- On political, social and economic criteria the divisions are as follows:
- Territories members of the European Union: Bulgaria, Greece and Romania
- Territories candidates for EU membership disapproved with deposited date for joining: Macedonia, Montenegro, and Turkey
- Territories which submitted application for candidate status for EU membership: Albania
- Territories considered as potential candidates for EU membership: Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo
- On border control and trade criteria the divisions are as follows:
- Territories members of the Schengen Area: Greece
- Territories candidates for the Schengen Area: Bulgaria, Romania
- Territories in a customs union with the EU: Turkey
- Territories members of the Central European Free Trade Agreement: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.
- On currency criteria the divisions are as follows:
- Territories members of the Eurozone: Greece
- Territories using the Euro without authorization by the EU: Kosovo and Montenegro
- Territories using the national currencies and candidates for the Eurozone: Bulgaria (lev), Romania (leu)
- Territories using the national currencies: Albania (lek), Bosnia and Herzegovina (convertible mark), Macedonia (denar) and Serbia (dinar).
- On military criteria the divisions are as follows:
- Territories members of NATO: Albania, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Turkey
- Territories members of the Partnership for Peace with Individual Partnership Action Plan and Membership Action Plan for joining NATO: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia and Montenegro
- Territories members of the Partnership for Peace: Serbia
- On the recent political, social and economic criteria there are two groups of countries:
- Territories with communist past: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania and Serbia
- Territories with capitalist past: Greece and Turkey
Regional organizations
See also the Black Sea Regional organizations
The Balkans have a population of 60–71 million and a population density of 80-91/km2, depending on whether the Turkish and Italian parts are counted within the peninsula. Without those, the peninsula has a population of about 48 million and a density of 99/km2.
Population by territories:
|Total population
|In the peninsula *
|Life expectancy
|23x15px Albania
|77.4 years
|23x15px Bosnia and Herzegovina
|74.9 years
|23x15px Bulgaria
|7,814,570[56] Ref.
|74.5 years
|23x15px Greece
|82 years
|23x15px Kosovo
|23x15px Macedonia
|74.2 years
|23x15px Montenegro
|23x15px Romania
|72.5 years
|23x15px Serbia
|74.2 years
|23x15px Turkey
|75 years[65]
|Balkans **
[*] The islands are not taken into account.
[***] Both census figures of Serbia and Kosovo in the table do not include North Kosovo, therefore in the population of the Balkans, made up of sum of the populations in the table, is added separately an additional number of 70,000 to include the missing population of North Kosovo.
The region's principal religions are Christianity (Eastern Orthodox, Catholic) and Islam (Sunni).[3] Eastern Orthodoxy is the majority religion in both the Balkan peninsula and the Balkan region. A variety of different traditions of each faith are practiced, with each of the Eastern Orthodox countries having its own national church.
- Territories in which the principal religion is Eastern Orthodoxy (with national churches in parentheses):
- Bulgaria (Bulgarian Orthodox Church)
- Greece (Greek Orthodox Church)
- Macedonia (Macedonian Orthodox Church)
- Montenegro (Serbian Orthodox Church and Montenegrin Orthodox Church)
- Romania (Romanian Orthodox Church)
- Serbia (Serbian Orthodox Church)
- Territories in which the principal religion is Catholicism:
- Territories in which the principal religion is Sunni Islam:
- Territories in which religious minorities encompass over 10% of the population:
- Albania: Albanian Orthodox Church and Catholicism
- Bosnia and Herzegovina: Serbian Orthodox Church and Catholicism
- Macedonia: Islam
- Montenegro: Islam
- Romania: Protestantism and Catholicism (including Eastern Catholic Church)
- Territories in which religious minorities encompass less than 10% of the population:
- Serbia: Catholicism, Protestantism and Islam (mainly in Sandžak)
- Croatia: Serbian Orthodox Church and Islam
- Turkey: Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity
The Jewish communities of the Balkans were some of the oldest in Europe and date back to ancient times. These communities were Sephardi Jews, except in Romania where the Jewish communities were Ashkenazi Jews. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the small and close-knit Jewish community is 90% Sephardic, and Ladino is still spoken among the elderly. The Sephardi Jewish cemetery in Sarajevo has tombstones of a unique shape and inscribed in ancient Ladino.[66] Sephardi Jews used to have a large presence in the city of Thessaloniki, and by 1900, some 80,000, or more than half of the population, were Jews.[67] The Jewish communities in the Balkans suffered immensely during World War II, and the vast majority were killed during the Holocaust. An exception were the Bulgarian Jews, most of whom were saved by Boris III of Bulgaria, who resisted Adolf Hitler, opposing their deportation to Nazi concentration camps. Almost all of the few survivors have emigrated to the (then) newly founded state of Israel and elsewhere. No Balkan country today has a significant Jewish minority.
The Balkan region today is a very diverse ethno-linguistic region, being home to multiple Slavic, Romance, and Turkic languages, as well as Greek, Albanian, and others. Romani is spoken by a large portion of the Romanis living throughout the Balkan countries. Throughout history many other ethnic groups with their own languages lived in the area, among them Thracians, Illyrians, Romans, Celts and various Germanic tribes. All of the aforementioned languages from the present and from the past belong to the wider Indo-European language family, with the exception of the Turkic languages (e.g., Turkish and Gagauz).
- Territories where the predominant language is from the Albanian language family:
- Albania and Kosovo
- Territories where the predominant language is from the Hellenic language family:
- Greece
- Territories where the predominant language is from the Latin language family:
- Romania
- Territories where the predominant language is from the Slavic language family:
- Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.
- Territories where the predominant language is from the Turkic language family:
- Turkey
- Territories in which there are minority language families encompassing over 10% of the population:
- Macedonia: Albanian language family
Most of the states in the Balkans are predominantly urbanized; the countries in which the rural population is the majority are Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo each being about 50% rural and 50% urban.[68]
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A list of cities with population of over 150,000 inhabitants:
|Urban pop.
|Metro pop.
|23x15px Serbia
|23x15px Bulgaria
|23x15px Greece
|23x15px Croatia
|23x15px Greece
|23x15px Macedonia
|23x15px Albania
|23x15px Bosnia and Herzegovina
|2013 (preliminary)[75]
|23x15px Bulgaria
|23x15px Bulgaria
|23x15px Slovenia
|Novi Sad
|23x15px Serbia
|23x15px Bulgaria
|23x15px Serbia
|23x15px Kosovoa
|23x15px Croatia
|2011[citation needed]
|23x15px Kosovoa
|23x15px Greece
|23x15px Montenegro
|Banja Luka
|23x15px Bosnia and Herzegovina
|2013 (preliminary)[79]
|23x15px Serbia
|Cities located within the Balkan peninsula, whose countries are not regarded as part of the Balkans
|23x15px Turkey
|23x15px Romania
|23x15px Turkey
|2010[82][better source needed]
|23x15px Italy
- [*] İstanbul is partly located in the Balkans, and partly in Asia.
See also
|^ Kosovo is the subject of a territorial dispute between the Republic of Kosovo and the Republic of Serbia. The Republic of Kosovo declared independence on 17 February 2008, but Serbia continues to claim it as part of its own sovereign territory. Kosovo's independence has been recognised by 108 out of 193 United Nations member states.
- ^ Colin S. Gray, Geoffrey Sloan. Geopolitics, Geography and Strategy. Retrieved 10 November 2014.
- ^ a b c "Balkans". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 2015-05-03.
The Balkans are usually characterized as comprising Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia—with all or part of each of those countries located within the peninsula. Portions of Greece and Turkey are also located within the geographic region generally defined as the Balkan Peninsula, and many descriptions of the Balkans include those countries too. Some define the region in cultural and historical terms and others geographically, though there are even different interpretations among historians and geographers.... Pop. (2002 est.) 59,297,000.
- ^ a b Okey, Robin (2007). Taming Balkan Nationalism. Oxford University Press.
- ^ Borza, EN (1992), In the Shadow of Olympus: The Emergence of Macedon, Princeton University Press, p. 58
- ^ Perlès, Catherine (2001), The Early Neolithic in Greece: The First Farming Communities in Europe, Cambridge University Press, p. 1
- ^ "British Museum - Ancient Greece". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ "Bulgaria". Hemus – a Thracian name. Indiana University. p. 54.
- ^ "Gods and Heroes of the Greeks: The Library of Apollodorus". Google Books. Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ a b Todorova, Maria N. (1997). Imagining the Balkans. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc. p. 27.
- ^ Андрейчин Л. и др., Български тъловен речник (допълнен и преработен от Д. Попов). Четвърто преработено и допълнено издание.: Издателство "Наука и изкуство". С., 1994
- ^ Todorova, Maria N. (1997). Imagining the Balkans. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc. p. 27.
- ^ "Balkhan Mountains". World Land Features Database. Land.WorldCityDB.com. Archived from the original on 28 February 2008. Retrieved 31 March 2008.
- ^ "Balkan". Encarta World English Dictionary. Microsoft Corporation. Archived from the original on 31 October 2009. Retrieved 31 March 2008.
- ^ "balkan". Büyük Türkçe Sözlük (in Turkish). Türk Dil Kurumu.
Sarp ve ormanlık sıradağ
- ^ Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Editors: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel and W.P. Heinrichs. Brill Online Reference Works.Balkan.
- ^ Todorova, Maria (2009). Imagining the Balkans. Oxford University Press US. p. 22. ISBN 0-19-538786-4.
- ^ Pavic, Silvia (22 November 2000). "Some Thoughts About The Balkans.". About, Inc. Archived from the original on 28 February 2008. Retrieved 31 March 2008.
- ^ Maria Todorova Gutgsell, Imagining the Balkans (Oxford University Press, 2009; ISBN 0199728380), p. 24.
- ^ "Balkanize". merriam-webster.com.
- ^ Bideleux, Robert; Ian Jeffries (2007). A history of Eastern Europe. Taylor & Francis. p. 37. ISBN 978-0-415-36627-4.
- ^ a b c Jelavich, Barbara (1983). History of the Balkans: Eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Cambridge University Press. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-521-27458-6.
- ^ "britannica.com". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ Istituto Geografico De Agostini, L'Enciclopedia Geografica – Vol.I – Italia, 2004, Ed. De Agostini p.78
- ^ Tintero, Felipa L.; Felicitas R. Manacsa. World Geography Affected by World Upheavals. Goodwill Trading Co., Inc. p. 51. ISBN 971-574-041-3.
- ^ Bideleux, Robert; Taylor, Richard (1996). European integration and disintegration: east and west. p. 249.
- ^ Pond, Elizabeth (2006). Endgame in the Balkans: Regime Change, European Style. Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution. p. 5. ISBN 978-0815771609.
- ^ Zoltan Hajdu, ed. (2007). "The European integration and regional policy of the West Balkans". Southeast-Europe: state borders, cross-border relations, spatial structures. Ivan Illes, Zoltan Raffay. Centre for Regional Studies. p. 141. ISBN 978-963-9052-65-9. Retrieved 18 October 2014.
- ^ "European Economic and Social Committee – Western Balkans". European Economic and Social Committee. Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ "European Union External Action – EU relations with the Western Balkans". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ Redaktion: PT-DLR. "Federal Ministry of Education and Research of Germany – Western Balkan Countries". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ Austrian Foreign Miniistry – The Western Balkans – A Priority of Austrian Foreign Policy
- ^ "WBIF – Western Balkans Investment Framework – Stakeholders". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ "European Commission – Trade – Countries and regions – Western Balkans". Retrieved 12 September 2014.
- ^ "Western Balkans: Enhancing the European Perspective" (PDF). Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council. 5 March 2008. Archived (PDF) from the original on 9 April 2008. Retrieved 8 April 2008.
- ^ "Perspectives on the Region" (PDF). Retrieved 19 July 2013.
- ^ "Regions and territories: Kosovo". BBC News. 20 November 2009. Archived from the original on 15 April 2010. Retrieved 17 April 2010.
- ^ Goldstein, I. (1999). Croatia: A History. McGill-Queen's University Press.
- ^ Joseph Roisman,Ian Worthington A Companion to Ancient Macedonia pp 342-345 John Wiley & Sons, 7 jul. 2011 ISBN 144435163X
- ^ Boundary between Greek and Latin
- ^ Twenty Years of Balkan Tangle. Mary Edith Durham (2007). p.125. ISBN 1-4346-3426-4
- ^ a b Considered a Bulgarian in Bulgaria
- ^ An economic and social history of the Ottoman Empire. Suraiya Faroqhi, Donald Quataert (1997). Cambridge University Press. p.652. ISBN 0-521-57455-2
- ^ Encyclopedia of World War I, Spencer Tucker, Priscilla Mary Roberts, p.242
- ^ Europe in Flames, J. Klam, 2002, p.41
- ^ Russia's life-saver, Albert Loren Weeks, 2004, p.98
- ^ Germany and the 2nd World War Volume III:The Mediterranean, south-east Europe, and north Africa, 1939–1941, Gerhard Schreiber, Bernd Stegemann, Detlef Vogel, 1995, p.484
- ^ Germany and the 2nd World War Volume III:The Mediterranean, south-east Europe, and north Africa, 1939–1941, Gerhard Schreiber, Bernd Stegemann, Detlef Vogel, 1995, p.521
- ^ Inside Hitler's Greece:The Experience of Occupation, Mark Mazower, 1993
- ^ Hermann Goring: Hitler's Second-In-Command, Fred Ramen, 2002, p.61
- ^ The encyclopedia of codenames of World War II#Marita, Christopher Chant, 1986, p.125-6
- ^ "Kosovo independence declaration deemed legal". Reuters. 22 July 2010. Retrieved 16 February 2014.
- ^ Ceremony marks the accession of Albania to NATO, NATO – News, 7 April 2009. Retrieved 18 April 2009.
- ^ "Report for Selected Countries and Subjects". International Monetary Fund. 2009–2016.
- ^ a b "Institute of Statistics of Albania. 2011 Census Results".
- ^ a b Agency for Statistics of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Estimate for 2011.
- ^ a b "National Statistical Institute of Bulgaria. 2011 Census Results".
- ^ a b http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/tgm/table.do?tab=table&init=1&language=en&pcode=tps00001&plugin=1 Official estimate
- ^ a b "Statistical Office of Kosovo. 2011 Census Results".
- ^ a b "State Statistical Office of Macedonia. Estimate for 2010" (PDF) (in Macedonian). Retrieved 17 April 2010.
- ^ a b "Statistical Office of Montenegro. 2011 Census Results".
- ^ a b "National Institute of Statistics of Romania. 2011 Census Results." (PDF) (in Romanian).
- ^ a b "Statistical Office of Serbia. 2011 Census Results".
- ^ "Turkish Statistical Institute".
- ^ "Turkish Statistical Institute. Registered population as of 2011".
- ^ "OECD Better Life Index".
- ^ European Jewish Congress – Bosnia-Herzegovina, Accessed 15 July 2008.
- ^ "Greece". Jewish Virtual Library.
- ^ "Data: Urban population (% of total)". The World Bank. 2006–2010.
- ^ a b c d "2011 Census of Population, Households and Dwellings in the Republic of Serbia: Comparative Overview of the Number of Population in 1948, 1953, 1961, 1971, 1981, 1991, 2002 and 2011, Data by settlements" (PDF). Statistical Office of Republic Of Serbia, Belgrade. 2014. ISBN 978-86-6161-109-4. Retrieved 2014-06-27.
- ^ a b c d "ПРЕБРОЯВАНЕ 2011" (PDF) (in Bulgarian). National Statistical Institute of Bulgaria. 2011.
- ^ a b c "Πίνακας 1: Προσωρινά αποτελέσματα του Μόνιμου Πληθυσμού της Ελλάδος: Ανακοίνωση προσωρινών αποτελεσμάτων Απογραφής Πληθυσμού 2011" (PDF) (in Greek). National Statistical Service of Greece. 2011.
- ^ "Popisane osobe, kućanstva i stambene jednice, prvi rezultati popisa 2011 (Grad Zagreb)" (in Croatian). Croatian Bureau of Statistics. 2011.
- ^ Government of the Republic of Macedonia. "2002 census results" (PDF). stat.gov.mk. Retrieved 2010-01-30.
- ^ "Population and Housing Census in Albania" (PDF). Institute of Statistics of Albania. 2011.
- ^ "Census 2013 preliminary" (PDF). Statistical office of Republika Srpska. 2013.
- ^ "Statistical Yearbook Ljubljana 2013". Place Names. City Administration, Department for Development and Investments. Retrieved 18 August 2014.
- ^ a b http://www.ask.rks-gov.net/ballina. Missing or empty
- ^ "Montenegrin 2011 census". Monstat. 2011.
- ^ "2013 census (preliminary)" (PDF). Statistical office of Republika Srpska. 2013.
- ^ "The Results of Address Based Population Registration System, 2013". Turkish Statistical Institute. 31 December 2013. Retrieved 29 January 2014.
- ^ "COMISIA JUDEŢEANǍ PENTRU RECENSĂMÂNTUL POPULAŢIEI ŞI AL LOCUINŢELOR, JUDEŢUL CONSTANTA" (PDF) (in Romanian). National Institute of Statistics of Romania. 2011.
- ^ "Turkey: Registered Population". List of the registered population by cities and provinces in the years 2010 and 2007, quoted from the State Institute of Statistics of the Republic of Turkey. City Population DE. 2010.
- ^ "ISTAT". National Institute of Statistics of Italy. 2009.
- Gray, Colin S. (1999). Geopolitics, Geography and Strategy. London, United Kingdom: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-7146-8053-8.
- Banac, Ivo (October 1992). "Historiography of the Countries of Eastern Europe: Yugoslavia". American Historical Review (University of Chicago Press) 97 (4): 1084–1104. JSTOR 2165494. doi:10.2307/2165494.
- Banac, Ivo (1984). The National Question in Yugoslavia: Origins, History, Politics. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-9493-2.
- Goldstein, Ivo (1999). Croatia: A History. Montreal, Quebec, Canada: McGill-Queen's University Press. ISBN 978-0-7735-2017-2.
- Carter, Francis W., ed. An Historical Geography of the Balkans Academic Press, 1977.
- Dvornik, Francis. The Slavs in European History and Civilization Rutgers University Press, 1962.
- Fine, John V. A., Jr. The Early Medieval Balkans: A Critical Survey from the Sixth to the Late Twelfth Century [1983]; The Late Medieval Balkans: A Critical Survey from the Late Twelfth Century to the Ottoman Conquest. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, [1987].
- Jelavich, Barbara (29 July 1983). History of the Balkans. Cambridge University Press.
- Jelavich, Charles and Jelavich, Barbara, eds. (1963). The Balkans in Transition: Essays on the Development of Balkan Life and Politics Since the Eighteenth Century. University of California Press.
- Kitsikis, Dimitri (2008). La montée du national-bolchevisme dans les Balkans. Le retour à la Serbie de 1830. Paris: Avatar.
- Lampe, John R., and Marvin R. Jackson; Balkan Economic History, 1550–1950: From Imperial Borderlands to Developing Nations Indiana University Press, 1982
- Király, Béla K., ed. East Central European Society in the Era of Revolutions, 1775–1856. 1984
- Komlos, John (15 October 1990). Economic Development in the Habsburg Monarchy and in the Successor States. East European Monographs No. 28. East European Monographs. ISBN 978-0-88033-177-7.
- Mazower, Mark (2000). The Balkans: A Short History. Modern Library Chronicles. New York: Random House. ISBN 0-679-64087-8.
- Stavrianos, L. S. (1 May 2000) [1958]. The Balkans since 1453. with Traian Stoianovich. New York: NYU Press. ISBN 978-0-8147-9766-2.
- Stoianovich, Traian (September 1994). Balkan Worlds: The First and Last Europe. Sources and Studies in World History. New York: M.E. Sharpe. ISBN 978-1-56324-032-4.
External links
|Wikimedia Commons has media related to Balkans.
|Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Balkans.
|Look up balkans in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
|Wikiquote has quotations related to: Balkans
|Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article Balkan Peninsula.
- SEEurope.net—news coverage on Southeastern Europe
- Southeast European Times
- Analysis from Balkans
- Photo impression
- Balkan Business News
- Balkanalysis.com- Objective Analysis, Research and News on the Balkans
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text:
I start a toon, and that toon's class and/or spec gets nerfed.
It happened with Ret (although it took Cata dropping for it to finally get there). It happened with Frost (again, Cata's release was the kicker). It happened with Locks, too.
And now it's happened with Rogues.
You don't notice that Rogues got nerfed a bit in Mists until you get higher up in level, around the 30s. That's when a lot of other toons start to get new abilities. Or their existing abilities take a big leap in utility.
Like, say, those damn Wild Imps.
Back in my day, when I leveled Adelwulf, we didn't have no stinking Wild Imps. We Warlocks took our lumps from every other class, and we LIKED it! And we walked to school barefoot, too! Uphill! Both ways!!
It's more than a bit disconcerting that in the L30s BGs you can suddenly find yourself fighting 4-5 on 1 due to those Wild Imps. Couple that with some improved AI on the succubus and the Lock is no longer the butt end of the BG spectrum like it was in Cata. In fact, if you put two Demonology Locks together and add one healer, you can pin an entire bunch of people down at the entrance in Arathi Basin.
A Rogue's ability is designed for maximum damage close in, sacrificing armor for speed. If the Rogue fails to kill the enemy quickly, then they're a sitting duck. In the L30s in Mists, what ends up happening is that those other classes take a big leap forward in survivability, whereas the Rogue's corresponding damage output levels off. This results in the Rogue being unable to pick on even the stragglers in a BG if they're of comparable level to the Rogue.
And you can forget about a healer. A Rogue simply doesn't have enough stuns to take out a healer of comparable level in the L30s.
From where I stand watching BGs in the mid-30s, the Feral Druid still rules the roost. The Disco Priest has fallen back a bit, and has been replaced by the Mistweaver Monk and Demonology Warlock. Warriors have gotten their mojo back a bit, and two warriors together can handle a group of 4-5 DPS. What I've found surprising is that Frost Mages have made a comeback of sorts. Back in Cata you had Fire and Arcane making inroads into BGs based upon their higher damage output, but it seems that in Mists that Frost has reasserted itself as the Mage PvP spec once more. As a (retired) Frost Mage player, it's nice to see the spec doing well. As a (current) Rogue player, however, they're harder to take down than before.
Paladins seem to have made a bit of a recovery from their easy pickings of the L20s, but they still trail Warriors in survivability. Ret still has the aftereffect from Cata's overhaul; the lack of decent emergency healing seems to hamper Ret more than anything else. Being a (retired) Ret player, I've noticed that the major Paladin failing in L30s Mists has nothing to do with the class, but with the player type. Pallies are more prone to charging in alone than any other class, save perhaps the Warrior, but without the Warrior's survivability. I call it the Sir Lancelot Syndrome*, which is an offshoot of how Pallies can simply plow through mobs in most other circumstances. It feeds a belief in invincibility, and encourages the "Follow me! Chaaaarge!" sort of behavior.
I was guilty of SLS as much as anyone else. I'm sure the gleaming armor and "Servant of the Light" didn't help, but I knew that even the Holy Spec wasn't as squishy as most classes, so it only made sense to wade into the thick of the fight. Additionally, in a game like AB where one player can gum up the works and divert 4-5 people away from trying to take another base, it's only natural that a class that can take a beating would be the one to storm the beachhead. In my hubris, I also figured that if I led by example, others would follow. Naturally, a few years of playing BGs has beaten that idea out of me, but I still backslide from time to time.
Warsong Gulch is one of those BGs where your opinion of it is entirely shaped upon how well your side does in it. You can top the meters day after day, but if your side doesn't win, you start to get bitter.** I recognized that in myself in the most recent losing streak I've been in, as it was an echo of my time leveling Adelwulf. There was this long period from L20 through L40 where my Lock could count on one paw the number of victories in WSG. My Rogue found the BG much better --winning about half of the time will do that to a person-- but this current losing streak can wear on a psyche.
When you port in and you see half of the other side is a healer of some sort, you know you're in trouble. The backbiting starts before even the first flag is captured, and the cries of "we ALWAYS suck!" fill the air. Players drop like flies, and people who replace them look around, declare "What a fail group!" and drop themselves.
It's enough to make a body back up, go out into a zone, and work on a gathering skill for a while.
Or maybe visit the Darkmoon Faire.
But WSG is still lurking there, like Lucy and her football, hoping to get the Charlie Brown of BG players back in for another go. "Surely it can't be that bad," you say to yourself.
"Yes it can," the pessimistic side of you retorts, "and don't call me Shirley."
"But maybe it's different this time."
"You said that the last time. And the time before that. And...."
"You know, when you talk to yourself, that's when you realize you're a bit off your rocker."
"So you're coming around to my way of thinking. Good job!"
Maybe I ought to give WSG another try. This streak has got to end sometime. After all, even Manchester City won the Premier League last year.
*SLS makes a catchy acronym, you know.
**And your XP moves forward at a snail's pace.

subset: commoncrawl


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Call type: Scam
Rating: -5
someone from Canada saying Medicare will pay for at home Hereditary Cancer risk test, non invasive.. Yeah right.!!! I suspect scammers... This came on post card sent thru United states post office... I guess not answering the phone has sent the crooks to using the mail......because it says they have been trying to reach us.....
Number: +1 (604) 942-9008
Call type: Harassment
Rating: -5
Calls 2-3 days a day, lower mortgage rate, credit card rate. SCAM
Peter, 2019-03-25 11:26:18
Number: +1 (800) 962-0126
Call type: Unknown
Rating: 0
Don't know who it is
Got this all in the afternoon, 2019-03-25 10:58:32
Number: +1 (604) 432-6304
Call type: Scam
Rating: -4
Caller with Indian accents says "calling from your computer security department".
Stéphane, 2019-03-25 10:31:20
Number: +1 (905) 872-4084
Call type: Scam
Rating: -5
J'ai reçu un texto me disant un numéro d'autorisation pour un retour d'argent. J'ai aucune idée de quoi il s'agit.
Number: +1 (888) 469-7995
Call type: Unknown
Rating: 0
Says they are from IRS and that I have lawsuit & an non-bailable arrest warrant issued for unreported income not filed and that they have strong evidence against me and that I must resolve this matter by pressing one and speaking with an officer or the police will come get me on the warrant.
Dulce, 2019-03-25 10:03:57
Number: +1 (833) 788-8758
Call type: Debt collector
Rating: -5
Really rude and unprofessional if you don't enjoy being yelled at,don't answer this number
Steve G, 2019-03-25 10:00:42
Number: +1 (705) 910-0106
Call type: Scam
Rating: -5
Said they were from revenue Canada & its the 2nd attempt to contact me & an arrest warrant has been issued for me. I'll be sent to jail if I don't respond & pay immediately. I don't owe CRA anything & I'd love to go to jail. No work. Free meals, laundry done, free golfing, secure place to sleep, no worries. A great vacation & its free! Haha


text:
Senior Burmese general Than Shwe did deign to meet Tuesday with United Nations special envoy Ibrahim Gambari after giving him the cold shoulder for days, but he met from a position of relative strength. No public comments were made. The democracy movement in Burma (the name recognized by the United States that predates the junta's change to Myanmar in 1989) seems to have been defeated, at least for now. The isolated and eccentric military regime watched as popular protests against its iron-fisted rule grew and then showed which side had the guns and the ruthlessness.
At least 4,000 Buddhist monks, who had been leading ever-growing peaceful protests, for more than two weeks have been rounded up, disrobed and shackled and are scheduled to be shipped out of Rangoon. The authorities say 10 people were killed during the government crackdown, but diplomats and other observers say the death toll is significantly higher. One former regime official says the bodies of hundreds of Buddhist monks have been dumped into remote jungles, and the body count could be in the thousands.
That would place it on a similar level to the 1988 demonstrations that were broken up at the cost of some 3,000 lives. Perhaps the only significant difference is that the regime seems to want to hide the extent of the bloodshed it inflicted rather than leaving bodies in the streets as an object lesson to anybody else who might think about speaking out in opposition.
Virtually the entire civilized world is outraged by the brutality of the Burmese military regime, but there was little the outside world could do. The generals have isolated Burma from most of the outside world except China, so economic sanctions leveled by any country are like a pinprick at best.
For all the brave and generally sincere talk about supporting freedom and democracy and lamenting the regime's brutality, no Western country was going to send troops to Burma. With virtually no economic stake and a place in the world that is not geopolitically strategic, Burma is on the periphery of most other countries' perceived core interests. Even if the United States or some European country had available troops to support the democracy movement, it might well not have been prudent to use them in Burma just now.
The only real hope for the demonstrators was the "whole world is watching" syndrome – the moral weight of world opinion. CNN and other international media did try to keep the brutal suppression in Burma in the forefront of international coverage – and the regime, by limiting in-country journalism and shutting off the Internet and other forms of communication, showed that it recognized the potential danger. But as nearly as we can tell, the only ideology that motivates the Burmese junta is the simple imperative of hanging onto power, and that was stronger than any fear of what the rest of the world might think of its brutality.
Does that mean any hope for freedom in Burma is lost? Perhaps not. Hope can never be squelched forever, and there are signs of disunity in the Burmese (or Myanmar) government.
The Asia Times reports that Gen. Maung Aye, second in command in the junta, opposed using force against the Buddhist monks. Some soldiers, according to reports from diplomats and aid officials, disobeyed orders to shoot into crowds. The junta may be divided about what to do in the aftermath of the political crisis. There could be a rebellion within the military.
China, the Burmese regime's only real ally and trading partner, is obviously not shocked at authoritarian tactics considering its own government's record. But it does see the Beijing Olympics next year as a coming-out party of sorts, the entrance of China into the company of respectable nations as a Great Power. Despite a poor record the past couple of weeks, it could eventually exercise a moderating influence on the Burmese regime.
It may be a blessing that no outside country is prepared or able to oust the military and support Burma's democracy movement with military force. Now the future of democracy is up to the Burmese, who have been given an example of bravery and willingness to suffer for a cause by Buddhist monks and thousands of others. Whether they can build enough on the obvious discontent to create the impetus for real reform is an open question. But we would be surprised if it took another 19 years for Burma's freedom movement to express itself publicly again.


text:
Columbine survivor brings message of hope
SOUTHBURY -- Crystal Woodman Miller can relate to the fear, chaos and questions racing through the minds of so many people as the result of Adam Lanza's Dec. 14 rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown that left 26 first-graders and educators dead.
That's because more than 13 years ago, Miller was a student at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., where two other students were responsible for the massacre that helped establish the words "school shooting" as one of the most dreaded phrases in the English language.
On Sunday, Miller brought a message of hope to Calvary Chapel, speaking to hundreds of worshippers at four services, twice the number normally held.
There are no answers to the question of why God couldn't stop a mad man with a gun from going into an elementary school and killing children and women, Miller said. There is also no formula to help the recovery of those directly impacted or otherwise affected by such a horrific event, she said.
But as "a sojourner and a fellow survivor," Miller, now an author, speaker and married with a second child on the way, said she was more than willing to share "the things that helped me along the way."
Chief among them, she said, was a faith in God and the hope and strength that it gave her to work her way back from the depression, guilt and hatred that she felt in the weeks and months after the April 20, 1999, shooting.
Miller was invited to speak by chapel Pastor John Eastman.
"I have a friend who knew her, and he told me to call her," Eastman said. "She was great and said she would come out whenever we wanted her."
Miller was in the school library with friends, cramming for a test for which she'd forgotten to study, when Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris burst in and filled the room with gunfire.
The library was practically ground zero, she said. Ten of the 13 people killed and 14 of the 25 wounded were there.
She and two friends hid under a table, and although she was not a church-goer or religious person, she recalls thinking, " `God, if you are real, get me out of here alive.' "
In her head, she said to herself: " `You will get out of here. You will have a story to share,'" Miller said. An instant later, the thought was gone, replaced by the sounds of gunfire, the screams of classmates and the overwhelming certainty she was about to die.
Then, she said, there was quiet, and she could hear Harris and Klebold saying they had run out of ammunition and left to get more.
In that brief respite, she and her friends fled to safety.
While those who died in Newtown, especially the children, are now safe in God's arms, Miller said, those who survived and others affected by the events will have difficult days ahead as they heal.
"This is a long process that is just beginning," she said.
Many of those in attendance said they found hope in Miller's words.
"I thought she did a great job," said Erich Wenis of Woodbury, whose nephew is in kindergarten at Sandy Hook Elementary School, but because he attends the afternoon session, wasn't there when the shootings occurred.
"He's having a tough time," Wenis said. "But she showed you can get through it."


text:
RIAA's Cary Sherman: We Really Just Want To Give Consumers What We, Er, They Want
from the help-us-help-you-help-us dept
Last week on his show Keen On, Andrew Keen wrapped up a series of music-industry-themed interviews (which included BitTorrent's Bram Cohen and Techdirt's new friend David Lowery) by talking to RIAA CEO Cary Sherman. The conversation is pretty tame, and Keen mostly just lets Sherman speak his piece, so I wanted to take a closer look at his answers and respond to some of his claims. This is not a complete transcript, but the first part of the interview is embedded below—in the next post I'll look at part two, in which Sherman answers some questions from Keen's viewers.
One thing is clear: Sherman has been following the public reaction to things like his diatribe in the New York Times, and he knows that everyone is sick of hearing him whine about infringement. He actually makes it through one-and-a-half semi-sincere answers before even using the word "piracy"—but after that it's virtually all he talks about. First, though, Keen simply asks him if he thinks the new ecosystem is better or worse for musicians. There are a lot of problems with his response:
It obviously depends on where you sit. For young, emerging artists they have more of an opportunity to get out in front of the public in ways that were never before imaginable. How much money they'll be able to make doing so is a serious question. Established artists are definitely doing worse than they used to be doing, and artists who are signed by labels are not getting the opportunities that they used to get when they were signed by a label: the marketing, the promotion, the exposure and of course sales.
So he apparently admits that the labels have failed at their job, and are now no longer even trying—and that artists will get more exposure going it alone since the labels provide no opportunities. I can't say I disagree. But the catch is the money, which he's sure isn't there:
So there are more income streams, but those income streams are much, much reduced. I think the Future of Music Coalition recently came out with a study showing that most artists are not benefiting substantially from these new revenue streams. And certainly if you look at the raw data from the industry, we're less than half the size that we were in 1999, we have way less than half the employment, fewer artists on the roster and so on and so forth.
Wait, does he mean the highly optimistic FMC study in which they concluded that "overall, digital technologies seem to be having a positive impact on musicians' earning capacity"? It's a shame Keen didn't push back on this point, because for Sherman to present that study as evidence that artists are worse off today is flagrantly dishonest. As for his "raw data", that says a lot about the failures of his corner of the industry (he's only talking about SoundScan sales and major label employment, glossing over the fact that the Big Six became the Big Three in that timespan) and very little about the overall situation for musicians. Next, Keen asks him why he thinks this is happening:
There are always a lot of factors involved in anything like that. There has obviously been a proliferation of new media and therefore competition from other media, but the fact is that more music is being consumed than ever before, just less and less of it is being paid for. I think we're now at a point where about 35% of music acquired is actually being paid for, so the rest is being taken for free.
I have no idea how Sherman arrived at that figure, but I'm a lot more than 35% sure it's bunk. I imagine the percentage of music that gets paid for is much, much lower—and always has been. With radio, television, music played in shops and in public spaces, free shows at bars, music played for friends, music played at parties, guitars strummed around a campfire and everything else in this music-saturated world, only a minuscule fraction of music consumed is actually paid for. Music is not, and never has been, a simple commodity. Sherman continues, paying lip service to all the market factors that have contributed to the decline in recorded music sales, and you can feel the tension building until he finally hits the p-word:
The fact is that piracy has had an enormous, really a devastating impact on the industry, because paying for music has become voluntary. It's a tip jar. If you don't want to pay for it you don't need to because you can always find online any of the music that you want. We're trying to come up with ways to offer the consumers the content that they want in ways that they want it, conveniently, reasonably priced, so that they will get it legitimately and compensate the creators. That is the number one anti-piracy strategy, which is basically offering consumers what they want.
That second part would be great, if the RIAA actually did any of that. Instead, time and time again we see them taking a sue-first, negotiate later strategy with new music services, and pushing legislation like SOPA/PIPA that puts a huge burden on innovators. Sherman then makes some comments about the businesses that profit from infringement, and Keen asks him to elaborate:
Megaupload is a great example. They were basically monetizing all the content that was stored in their lockers that they would distribute to people who would click on links all over the internet to get that content for free. Kim Dotcom was earning millions and the creators were earning nothing at all.
While it's possible, even likely, that Megaupload broke the law and some of the charges against them will stick, the assertion that creators were "earning nothing" is not quite true. Creators who embraced Megaupload were benefitting from it and were indeed earning money through its bounty payments for popular uploads. That's why we saw both well-established artists like Busta Rhymes and indie artists like Dan Bull take Megaupload's side after it was shut down.
Keen then asks if there are any legal businesses profiting by monetizing the content of artists, which elicits a bizarre answer from Sherman:
There's no question that all the companies that are providing access to music are benefiting in some way, legal companies, and that's entirely appropriate. ISPs have done very well by the availability of music online, because it has created greater demand for broadband access, and as a result they have now penetrated to the 66-67% level of US households, because they want access to the content that the entertainment industry offers. But that's perfectly fine.
Well, I suppose it's good to know that Sherman approves of broadband. As far as I know, the RIAA has never pushed the kind of "piracy tax" on ISPs that some organizations around the world have proposed. I guess they don't plan to start now. Of course, his answer also exposes the hubris of the legacy entertainment industry: he thinks their content is the only content anyone wants, and that they alone are responsible for broadband adoption.
Eventually Sherman can't stall any longer and starts to talk about enforcement, which, it quickly becomes clear, is all he really cares about. He actually defends their past strategy of suing file-sharers, saying that it was successful in spreading awareness and curtailing the growth of peer-to-peer networks, but then quickly reverses and says that since P2P is growing once again, it necessitated the
five- six-strike plan they recently negotiated with ISPs (and the government). It's amusing to watch Sherman try to describe a consumer-punishment plan in a way that sounds "consumer-friendly":
So we did a deal with ISPs under which ISPs would send notices that we send to the ISP that a user on their network is infringing, they will send a copyright alert to the user and there will be educational materials associated with it, FAQs, all the information about how we got the information, whether they should check whether they have a wireless router that's unsecured, all that sort of stuff. And after awhile if they continue to persist in this behavior, over four and five and six notices, there might be some mitigation measures imposed like throttling bandwidth or something like that, up to the individual ISP. But the idea is to, in a very consumer friendly way, educate the public about what copyright is all about, the consequences of violating copyright, and the long term importance of preserving the content that people want.
Thankfully, Keen pushes back a bit on this point and notes that most people don't consider the RIAA to be very consumer-friendly at all, especially not after they tried to push SOPA on everyone. He asks Sherman if he thinks they can convince people otherwise. It's the last question, and I'll leave you with Sherman's answer in full, because it's a doozie. He immediately jumps to the unrelated topic of counterfeiting, incorrectly calls boots and batteries "copyrighted products", and then, having said absolutely nothing about how SOPA would help musicians, claims that's who we needed it for. For some reason, he chooses to end the interview with the random assertion that aspiring musicians are giving up and becoming lawyers (which is funny because the first person who comes to mind is Bill Patry—no friend of the RIAA's cause). With that in mind, enjoy:
For one thing, just because we don't want to get back into SOPA, but SOPA was not just about copyrighted music or movies, it was about counterfeit products too. It was designed to protect American consumers from counterfeit products like pharmaceuticals, which are actually being sold to American consumers from fraudulent websites on the internet. There are every kind of copyrighted product, from boots to Rosetta Stone language materials to things that could actually endanger your lives like batteries that could blow up and so on. So this really was designed to protect consumers against counterfeit websites that were operating from overseas and selling into the US market. Did we lose some consumer trust? Absolutely. What happened with SOPA has created a lot of skepticism on the part of the online community that were interested in consumer welfare, but it all depends on how you look at consumer welfare. We think that consumer welfare is not getting a product for free, but getting the best possible product you can. And if our artists make music that people want, it's a win-win for everyone, and we think that the long-term consumer interest is in creating an ecosystem in which there is compensation for creators so that they can be paid for their craft to go on making music. I don't know how many would-be musicians have gone to law school instead because they've seen that their opportunities in the music industry have been disappearing with every new illegal downloading technology. But it's our job to somehow create an ecosystem that makes consumers happy, makes creators happy and works for everybody.
Filed Under: andrew keen, cary sherman, copyright, music industry
Companies: riaa


text:
LEMONT – Owners of vehicles that are registered to a village of Lemont address have until July 31 to display a village vehicle sticker.
Stickers are available for purchase at the Lemont Village Hall, 418 Main St., and the Lemont Police Facility, 14600 127th St. The two-year stickers are to be posted until the end of July 2015.
To accommodate residents, the Village Hall will be open from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday.
Those who purchase stickers by July 31 will pay half the full sticker price. For sticker rates, visit www.lemont.il.us/index.aspx?nid=170
For questions, contact the village at 630-257-1550.


text:
Wead is a Windows Phone 8 app that lets you insert local weather information on to your photos. The app acts more like a plug-in, accessible through the edit menu when you view individual photos in the Pictures Hub.
Weave was updated today to version 2.0 and brings a new user interface and a sharing option to the table. The new user interface calls for you to enter your location then retrieve the current weather conditions. From there you choose your temperature units, font style and color then set your text position with the slider controls.
Once you've saved your Wead image, you can share it through your typical Windows Phone sharing avenues (email, sms, social networks, etc.).
While the update does bring more functionality to Wead, there's still room for improvement. There is a nice selection of font styles, but you really need a selection of font sizes. As is, I found the text to be too small and the spacing between the City location and weather information is rather large as well.
Still, the version 2.0 update for Wead takes the app in the right direction it just needs a little typesetting adjustments. If you haven't tried Wead, it's a free app for your Windows Phone 8 device and you can find it here in the Windows Phone Store.


text:
Native English speakers needed in Beijing of China Good Pay free accommodation No experience require
at ForeignerHR in Beijing
Native English speakers needed in Beijing of China Good Pay free accommodation No experience required
ForeignerHR (www.foreignerhr.com) is a professional employment and visa agency based in Beijing, the capital of China. The company has been in the market for more than ten years; its personnel have vast experience in placing foreign teachers as well as teaching foreigners Chinese. During this time, we have placed more than 4000 foreigners in different schools and companies. We have always kept good relationships with foreigners as well as with the schools..
Different from other recruiters, we are a registered company and have ability to get you a working visa and we sign the contract with the foreign teachers and we always do our utmost to assist the foreign teachers before they come & throughout the entire employment contract here in Beijing. We can also guarantee all the schools we have in Beijing are in good locations for foreigners. Besides all of these, we also provide competitive salary package and benefits you can choose. We will be very patient and direct you step by step and give you help through the whole time you are in China.
We can give you 8000 Yuan/month, we will provide you nice free accommodation and if you finish one year contract give you 6000 Yuan as airfare bonus.
The expenses in China are much cheaper, normal Chinese people earn about 3000-4000 Yuan/month. So the salary is definitely big enough for you to have a good life in China.
We do not have much requirement about the teachers. As long as you are a native English speaker and like teaching kids, its ok. We will give you free training and free TESOL certificate and help you to gain experience.
Since our jobs are mostly teaching kids of 2-10 years old, so we prefer the teachers are outgoing and like kids.
We do not care your passed life or experience, we will develop your potencial. Another city is possible, Today send your RESUME and PICTURE to
Note: Please mention Chinaesljob.com when applying.
Recent jobs at ForeignerHR
Is this job ad fake? Report it!
Recommend to a friend
Viewed: 311 times


text:
Dazzling sexy ebony hottie chick Adrian Maya sucks a mighty oversized cock of a lucky dude in her small teen mouth
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text:
Political Papers Collections
Main Content
Housing the political papers of several significant local, regional, state and national politicians and political appointees, as well as the records of several regional governmental and political advocacy organizations, SCRC is an important center for the study of Illinois, regional and national politics. Large political papers collections include those of:
- US Senators Paul Simon and Roland Burris
- US Representatives Ken Gray and Glenn Poshard
- Illinois State Senator Kenneth Buzbee
- St. Louis Mayor Clarence Harmon
- Jeanne Hurley Simon, Illinois state representative and chair of the U. S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science
Records of political organizations include those of the Carbondale Railroad Relocation Authority, the Carbondale League of Women Voters, the Carbondale Foundation for a Better Environment, the Sierra Club Shawnee Group, the Carbondale Peace Center, and the Peace Coalition of Southern Illinois.
Our collections cover topics of regional interest such as coal and energy resources, development of the interstate highway system, agriculture, management of the Shawnee National Forest and other natural resources, and the growth of Southern Illinois University.
To make a gift or donation to SCRC's Political Papers unit, please visit the Donating and Giving page.


text:
Thursday, October 21, 2010
In This Episode: VINO Attacks at CAS/His $$accountant's$$ office
CAS finds that UCI's Vinokourov fine is not valid - Kazakh will not have to pay year's salary for 2007 positive
"Alexandre Vinokourov (Astana) will not have to pay a fine equivalent to his then annual salary of €1.2 million as a result of his positive test for a blood transfusion at the 2007 Tour de France. According to El Pais, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) found against the International Cycling Union (UCI) and in favour of Vinokourov at a hearing in Lausanne on August 31..." MORE
COMMENTS: No Commentary Required, though one can imagine that CAS saw the image of VINO attacking underwater and decided that discretion was the better part of valor.
NEVERTHELESS, How it is that VINO is VINO and all others are pretenders, using the case of Danilo "Wannabe Killer" Di Luca as an example:
Di Luca (who gave himself the nickname " The Killer from Spoltore")
"...It is Di Luca's second doping suspension after he was already banned for three months in 2007 for being linked to the Oil for Drugs affair. CONI also announced that his initial fine of 280,000 Euro was being reduced to 106,400 Euro."
VINO (Алексaндр Николаевич Винокуров holds the rank of Colonel in the Kazakh Army - Қазақстанның Қарулы күштері Qazaqstannyñ Qarūly küshteri)
COMMENTS: In case you don't get it, while Di Luca obviously has some value and celebrity in order to secure a reduction in his fine, to be VINO is to not be fined, and in fact, I expect that shortly the UCI will offer to pay VINO the amount it originally requested of him, in hopes that he won't attack Pat McQuaid in a more literal sense.
"I am happy with my performance, I am finding my legs again. Now I want to attack in the Pyrénées."
should actually have read:
"I am happy with my performance, I am finding my legs again. Now I want to attack the Pyrénées."
9 comments:
- Anonymous22 October, 2010 08:46
Why is Di Luca not getting a Life for a second offense or at least the minimum of 8 years?ReplyDelete
Why? Because the UCI is corrupt? B/c money talks? B/c DiLuca is a big draw in Italy and around the world? Who knows. I'm going to end-up in prison and meanwhile Basso's sister will be blowing DiLuca in the back seat of a team car en route to Liege-Bastogne-Liege, you watch...ReplyDelete
- Anonymous22 October, 2010 14:56
When will your client list become public?ReplyDelete
Not for me to decide. That's out of my hands and up to the authorities.ReplyDelete
- Anonymous22 October, 2010 19:22
I don't get it. I was promised a big scandal and got nothin.ReplyDelete
I guess Lance is taking up all their resources...statute of limitations and all. Don't worry, if the stuff gets "lost" I'll make public more than 187 names.ReplyDelete
Hey Anon, one other thing. Let this incident show you what's really behind "journalists" like Bonnie Ford who create the expectation of scandal in readers like yourself, only to fail to deliver because their original reporting wasn't driven by any intention to relay the truth, but rather, focused solely on appealing to base instincts and sensationalism.ReplyDelete
- Anonymous23 October, 2010 16:29
187 names and only 2 have gone down. I'm thinking i migth have to make some phone calls.ReplyDelete
You should always feel free to do whatever it is that you think you need to do...ReplyDelete
Pappillon welcomes your comments and encourages your participation. However, in commenting, you agree that you will not:1) Post material that infringes on the rights of any third party, including intellectual property, privacy or publicity rights. 2) Post material that is unlawful, obscene, defamatory, threatening, harassing, abusive, slanderous, hateful, or embarrassing to any other person or entity as determined by Pappillon in its sole discretion. 3) Impersonate another person.