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So many students will graduate from Slippery Rock University this spring that administrators have had to limit the number of guests each one can invite.
There isn't enough room in the basketball arena for everybody.
At a time when American higher education is under fire for dismal graduation rates that have eroded the nation's leadership in college degree-holders, this public university in western Pennsylvania will graduate a record number of students, and do so more quickly than in years past.
That's because Slippery Rock has built in aggressive new measures to help students succeed—and eliminated many obstacles that make success so elusive almost everywhere else.
It lowered the number of credits required to graduate, which, as at many other schools, had been creeping up and keeping students in school longer. It trained residence-hall staff to watch for signs of academic or personal problems such as absences or poor grades. It clustered students with the same majors in dorms so they can help one another with class work, and hired 90 peer tutors to run a tutoring center in the library.
Altruism alone didn't compel the university to take these steps. It was money—$1.5 million a year, to be exact.
Slippery Rock may be the poster child for a resurgent idea called"performance funding," which pays public universities to meet goals set by increasingly results-conscious state legislatures.
Under Pennsylvania's performance-funding formula, Slippery Rock has earned as much as $1.5 million a year more from the state for improving its outcomes than it would h ave otherwise, said provost William Williams.
"Whether you like this method or not, the purpose was to drive up the quality of this institution," Williams said. "It's what we should have been about anyway."
Yet, until now, public universities and colleges were largely given money based on how many students they enrolled, not how many actually graduated.
The schools didn't focus on success, said Williams, "because they didn't have to."
Now their budgets are beginning to depend on it.
"This is coming, whether people like it or not," said Thomas Harnisch, a policy analyst at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities who monitors the trend.
When performance funding was first tested in the 1990s, many universities resisted it, "gamed" the numbers or even cheated, research by the Community College Research Center (CCRC) at Teachers College, Columbia University, and others has found.
But tight budgets have prompted dozens of states to try the idea again. And universities are coming around to it.
That's because performance funding no longer just involves vying for cash bonuses above and beyond universities' annual budgets. Now universities are competing for their share of dwindling state allocations.
"It's not the cherry on top anymore," says Travis Reindl, a higher-education researcher for the National Governors Association. "It's the base."
The Obama administration also wants to use money as a motivator. It has proposed a $1 billion competition, modeled after the Race to the Top program, to reward universities for becoming more affordable and raising graduation rates, and to withhold federal financial aid from universities that raise tuition too quickly.
"This has really burst back onto the scene," said Stan Jones, former Indiana commissioner of higher education and now president of Complete College America, which pushes states to improve graduation rates. Only 55 percent of students at four-year universities graduate within six years, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. And, the United States has fallen to 16th in the world in the proportion of 25- to 34-year-olds with a college or university degree, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reports.
The first round of performance funding began in 1979 in Tennessee. Twenty-five more states joined the movement in the 1990s and early 2000s, when healthy tax revenues enabled them to give financial bonuses to universities and colleges for meeting certain goals. But as the money dried up, one state after another abandoned the idea.
A revival began in 2007, led by Washington and Indiana. The portion of public-university budgets tied to performance, or that will eventually be tied to performance, varies from state to state, ranging from 6.5 percent in Indiana to 45 percent for technical colleges in Texas.
"Through performance funding we will show that each dollar we spend on higher education provides a greater return than if the dollar were spent on one of the numerous other competing worthy causes," the Illinois Board of Higher Education pronounced. "We know we must be able to demonstrate that we can deliver a return on investment."
State strategies vary. In Indiana, university budgets will be based on four things: the number of students who complete courses (instead of the number who enroll); the time it takes students to earn degrees; the number of degrees awarded; and the number of degrees earned by low-income students.
Ohio's performance goals for universities include making it easier for students to transfer credits, and limiting the number of credits required to graduate. Tennessee will allocate state money for higher education based on such metrics as the number of students reaching milestones of 24, 48, and 72 credits. Louisiana will tie part of universities' budgets to successes in improving graduation and job-placement rates, among other measures. And Texas already rewards universities for increasing the number of degrees awarded, and enrolling older, low-income and at-risk students who score below national averages on the SAT or ACT.
Various performance funding strategies are also under way, planned or being considered in Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, North Dakota, Oregon, South Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia.
Rather than continuing to give money to universities based on how many seats they fill, Jones said, "It's astonishing that, after 60 or 70 years, [states have] finally got around to the point of saying, 'Okay, did anybody graduate?' "
Now some states are also imposing penalties based on performance. When Indiana cut the budgets of its universities and colleges, it made deeper cuts for those with higher per-student costs and lower graduation rates.
Several studies, including two by the CCRC, show that even in its earlier incarnation, performance funding had an impact.
In Ohio, the average time it took to earn a bachelor's degree fell. Pennsylvania reported fewer dropouts, higher graduation rates, more diversity and higher faculty productivity. Texas saw a 9.3 percent increase in the number of degrees awarded.
Academic strategies also shifted. Tennessee universities increased tutoring and advising. Community colleges in Washington eliminated fees for degrees or certificates, which had prevented some students from graduating. In Florida, community colleges monitored withdrawal rates to weed out and retrain faculty whose courses students most commonly dropped.
At Slippery Rock, the proportion of students who graduate within four years has jumped to almost 38 percent (from below 22 percent), and within six years to nearly 58 percent (from below 52 percent).
"That's a significant change in the success of our students," said Williams, the provost. "You have to recalibrate your entire campus to remember that the reason they're here is for your students to be successful."
There are plenty of critics of performance funding. If universities get money based on their success rates, critics say, they're unlikely to admit marginal students who have potential but may have trouble graduating. To keep the money coming in, these critics say, universities might lower standards to make it easier to earn degrees.
In fact, one CCRC study reported that several university branch campuses in Ohio categorized rising juniors as transfer students to meet performance-funding targets. A faculty member at a Florida community college reported being told to push students into more courses than they needed, so the school would get extra performance points. In several states, faculty reported being pressured to avoid giving failing grades, while admissions counselors said they were instructed to reject marginal students.
Education analysts also say that universities with different missions and resources shouldn't all be forced to meet the same goals.
"What you're doing is you're taking a university, which is a very complex enterprise, and you're attempting to boil it down into a few quantifiable metrics," Harnisch said.
And some things, educators say, are beyond their control.
"This seems to be a way of saying, well, by putting pressure on colleges and universities, we'll force them to be better managers, and that will make the problems go away," said Garrison Walters, former executive director of the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education and interim chancellor of the Ohio Board of Regents. "Trashing the structure and management of American higher education as a way of making a point about costs damages the infrastructure that's intrinsic to the solution."
For now, though, as universities start to make the changes required by performance funding, some are even using money to motivate faculty and students. Slippery Rock, for instance, promises money for travel, conferences and lab equipment to departments that hire faculty who meet Pennsylvania's performance-funding targets for diversity and for new professors to have particular credentials.
Ball State University, in Indiana, gives a $500 scholarship to every in-state student on track to earn a degree within four years. It also has cut tuition in summer classes by 18 percent to keep students moving through.
"We were trying to create some financial incentives," said Jo Ann Gora, Ball State's president. Not to mention, she said, that anything that raises the four-year graduation rate "will ultimately help us with performance funding."
This story appeared on Time.com on April 25, 2012 as part of an exclusive collaboration. Republication is not allowed.


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How does one rank the majesty of a mountain? Or the serenity of a babbling brook? Or the communal beauty of a school of fish, swimming as a single unit despite its thousands of individual members with unique hopes and dreams and ambitions? The short answer is: One cannot. The long answer is: Lol, fuck off, this is the internet and anything is possible. That's why I'm ranking all the fruits.
We've looked at more easily rankable stuff in the past here—fast-food French fries, soul food items, the Shake Shack menu—but it's a different, infinitely more ludicrous ballgame acting as judge and jury for something that predates humans. Mother Earth spit fruits up from the dirt millions of years ago with no intention of being judged, and I respect that.
That said, all rankings, at their core, are just means for us to maximize our enjoyment out of life. We are all constantly ranking stuff in our own minds even if we don't realize it. If Rocky IV and Rocky II are on TV at the same time, you know to flip to Rocky IV because it's a better movie and you've preloaded that judgment in your mind. The same concept applies when choosing between an apple and an orange at the Holiday Inn Express complimentary breakfast buffet. You absolutely can, and should, compare apples to oranges.
Like all other super important things, ranking fruit is difficult. There are thousands of species of fruit in the world, and since we have other important #journalism to get to, I had to narrow it down. I took a trip to mt local big-chain grocery store—shout out to Ralph's!—and wrote down all the varieties of fruit they carry, while excluding some exotics in the process. Pluots and kumquats are cool, but they aren't exactly accessible. I also added in some common fruits that were not available because of seasonality. It would have been a travesty to leave cherries out of a fruit list.
I must also clarify that I'm using the socially accepted definition of fruit, as opposed to the botanical definition. Yeah, I know tomatoes and pumpkins and avocados and zucchini and olives are technically fruits. But, if you ordered a fruit salad and it came with cubes of pumpkin, you'd probably be pissed.
The actual ranking was more intuitive than scientific, but some rules were established. The main judgment of the fruit must be based off its pure, whole form, though common uses of that fruit may be used in the event of a tiebreaker. I also operated under the assumption that you are not some sort of ripeness savant, and that you sometimes may have to deal with under or overripe fruit. Consistency, convenience, flavor, and texture were the main deciding factors.
Enough with the qualifiers and methodology already—here is the only ranking of fruits you should care about.

subset: commoncrawl


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By MARK SHERMAN
Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — A sharply divided U.S. Supreme Court ruled Monday that some companies with religious objections can avoid the contraceptives requirement in President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, the first time the high court has declared that businesses can hold religious views under federal law.
The justices' 5-4 decision, splitting conservatives and liberals, means the Obama administration must search for a different way of providing free contraception to women who are covered under the health insurance plans of objecting companies.
Justice Samuel Alito wrote in his majority opinion, over a dissent from the four liberal justices, that forcing companies to pay for methods of women's contraception to which they object violates the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act. He said the ruling is limited and there are ways for the administration to ensure women get the birth control they want.
But White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the decision creates health risks for women, and he said Congress should take action to make sure they get coverage.
"President Obama believes that women should make personal health care decisions for themselves rather than their bosses deciding for them," Earnest said. "Today's decision jeopardizes the health of the women who are employed by these companies."
Contraception is among a range of preventive services that must be provided at no extra charge under the health care law that Obama signed in 2010 in what is considered the major success of his first term. Nearly 30 million women receive birth control as a result of the health law, the government has said.
Benefits experts say they expect little impact from the ruling because employers use health benefits to recruit and retain workers. But one constitutional law scholar, Marci Hamilton of Yeshiva University, cautioned that more than 80 percent of U.S. corporations are closely held and she said they could "now be able to discriminate against their employees."
Two years ago, Chief Justice John Roberts cast the pivotal Supreme Court vote that saved the law in the midst of Obama's campaign for re-election. On Monday, Roberts sided with the four justices who would have struck down the law in its entirety, holding in favor of the religious rights of closely held corporations, like the Hobby Lobby chain of arts-and-craft stores that challenged the contraceptives provision.
Hobby Lobby is among roughly 50 businesses that have sued over covering contraceptives. Some, like the two involved in the Supreme Court case, are willing to cover most methods of contraception, as long as they can exclude drugs or devices that the government says may work after an egg has been fertilized.
But Monday's ruling would apply more broadly to other companies that do not want to pay for any of the 20 birth control methods and devices that have been approved by federal regulators.
Alito said the decision is limited to contraceptives. "Our decision should not be understood to hold that an insurance-coverage mandate must necessarily fall if it conflicts with an employer's religious beliefs," he said.
He suggested two ways the administration could deal with the birth control issue. The government could simply pay for pregnancy prevention, he said. Or it could provide the same kind of accommodation it has made available to religious-oriented, not-for-profit corporations.
Those groups can tell the government that providing the coverage violates their religious beliefs. At that point, creating a buffer, their insurer or a third-party administrator takes on the responsibility of paying for the birth control. The employer does not have to arrange the coverage or pay for it. Insurers get reimbursed by the government through credits against fees owed under other provisions of the health care law.
That accommodation is the subject of separate legal challenges, and the court said Monday that profit-seeking companies could not assert religious claims in such a situation.
Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was part of the majority, also wrote separately to say the administration can solve its problem easily. "The accommodation works by requiring insurance companies to cover, without cost sharing, contraception coverage for female employees who wish it," Kennedy said. He said that arrangement "does not impinge on the plaintiffs' religious beliefs." Kennedy is considered the swing vote on the nine-member court that is evenly divided between conservative and liberal justices.
Houses of worship and other religious institutions whose primary purpose is to spread the faith are exempt from the requirement to offer birth control.
In a dissent she read aloud from the bench, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg called the decision "potentially sweeping" because it minimizes the government's interest in uniform compliance with laws affecting the workplace. "And it discounts the disadvantages religion-based opt-outs impose on others, in particular, employees who do not share their employer's religious beliefs," Ginsburg said.
Leaders of women's rights groups blasted the decision by "five male justices," in the words of Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.
The administration said a victory for the companies would prevent women who work for them from making decisions about birth control based on what's best for their health, not whether they can afford it. The government's supporters pointed to research showing that nearly one-third of women would change their contraceptive if cost were not an issue; a very effective means of birth control, the intrauterine device, can cost up to $1,000.
The contraceptives at issue before the court were the emergency contraceptives Plan B and ella, and two IUDs.
A survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation found 85 percent of large American employers already had offered such coverage before the health care law required it.
Hobby Lobby has more than 15,000 full-time employees in more than 600 crafts stores in 41 states. Hobby Lobby is owned by the family of David Green, who are evangelical Christians.
The other company is Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp. of East Earl, Pennsylvania, owned by a Mennonite family and employing 950 people in making wood cabinets.
Associated Press writers Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Jessica Gresko and Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.
Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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The Late Movies: 11 Video Game Speedruns
A speedrun is the act of playing a video game (usually the entire thing from start to finish) as fast as possible. In some cases a speedrun may use glitches in the game or other shortcuts to get through it quickly -- an example of a shortcut that people of a Certain Age may remember is the warp tubes in Super Mario Brothers. On the other hand, Glitching is actually a whole gaming subculture, in which gamers do stuff like run through walls in order to reach unexpected parts of the map. Who knew?
So tonight, I present eleven epic speedruns through popular (and not so popular) video games. SPOILER ALERT: if you haven't played through the entire game, these videos are by definition total spoilers!
Super Mario Brothers in 5 Minutes
This brings back memories! If you're curious about the methodology, check out this YouTube page and read the author's description. He posts a FAQ including this gem: "Q11: So where did you mess up? A11: I didn't mess up in level 8-3 where I ran into the bottom of the flagpole, this was actually completely intentional so that I avoid the fireworks which wastes time. I really only messed up in level 8-4 (right after the walljump I wasted about half a second.)"
Note: this does use mild glitches (some enemies don't hit Mario properly, even when it looks like they do), and of course the warp tubes.
Super Mario Brothers on Top of a Building
This surfaced in July, but deserves a second look.
Super Mario Bros. from Andreas Heikaus on Vimeo.
Portal Done Pro
I actually haven't watched this whole video because I'm stuck halfway through Portal and want to figure it out myself. But in this video, a very talented player uses glitches to get through the whole game in about fifteen minutes. If/when you're confused as to what the heck is going on, check out his 15-part commentary. I listened to part of the commentary, and it's actually pretty amazing -- the sheer effort involved in this speedrun is just shocking.
Oh, and if you want to watch this video in various flavors of HD, go to YouTube. (There are also links in the video description to download an "insane quality" version via BitTorrent.)
Contra in Under 14 Minutes
Oh, Contra, my old NES friend. There's also a notable video of someone playing the Xbox Live version and unlocking all the achievements.
Super Mario Brothers 3 in 11 Minutes
Not much to say about this one. It makes me a little dizzy, I guess that's something to say about it.
Super Mario 64 in Under 16 Minutes
This is a "tool-assisted" speedrun.
Left 4 Dead "Leeroy Jenkins" Expert Speedrun
So if you don't know who or what Leeroy Jenkins is, ask your friend Google. But the gist of this video is, this player decided to use Mr. Jenkins's strategy to get through Left for Dead in Expert mode in just under 7 minutes. Zombiemania ensues. (Note: I'm not an L4D player so can't judge this myself, but some commenters on YouTube claim this is not Expert Mode. In any case, it's intense.)
Half-Life in Half an Hour
I still haven't played Half-Life (I know, I know), so I haven't watched much of this. But I enjoyed the author's notes: "This is my segmented Half-Life speedrun, done by me, Blake "Spider-Waffle" Piepho. I had the idea for this in year 2000, started working on it in 2003, and completed it in October 2006. This run was done through many small segments in aim of achieving a high level of perfection. The final time from start to the death blow on Nihilanth is 29:41."
Super Metroid (SNES) in 30 Minutes
Although no longer the fastest speedrun of this game, this is pretty crazy. I'm also confused by why the YouTube video is an hour long if the speedrun is 30 minutes (perhaps they don't count loading time?), and how exactly they managed to post an hour-long YouTube video in one piece. Anyway, check it out:
Morrowind in 7:30
I'm not super sure what Morrowind even is, but zipping through this video it seems way trippy.
Dragon's Lair (NES) in Under 5 Minutes
Dragon's Lair in its arcade form was famously hard, and thus super-expensive. Remember that game with the amazing animation that cost 50 cents and you died in 30 seconds? Yeah, that's the one. This NES version seems equally maddening (the speedrun's author claims it's "the hardest game in history"). I can't imagine how painful it would have been to play this and pay for it.
If you're not familiar with Dragon's Lair, check out its Wikipedia page, especially the "Technical" section which includes some remarkable information about the Laserdisc system used to power the game. I had an opportunity to play the original Laserdisc system for free in 2000, and I can tell you, it was still insanely challenging and annoying. But the graphics remained awesome.
The Source of All Speedruns
If you're into this kind of thing, check out the Speed Demos Archive, which currently includes official speedrun times for 623 games, with links to videos for each and often detailed commentary by the speedrunner.


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Recently, I was directed toward an excellent analysis of commons-based peer production as a phenomenon which separates "entrepreneurs" (who want to get things done and create value in the world) from "capitalists" (who want to get a return on an investment of property without contributing any labor). An observer -- clearly outside of the community of free software developers -- expressed dismay at the example of Mozilla Foundation, which makes money from the open source Mozilla project, but does not pay for most voluntarily contributed code improvements to the Mozilla software. Is he right? Is this exploitation of those contributors?
Jed Harris wrote an excellent piece called "Capitalists vs. Entrepreneurs" in his Anomalous Presumptions blog. It's a great piece, because it puts a lot of the relationships in free software and other commons-based production into an economic perspective. Some of the conclusions are obvious to anyone familiar with the free software community, but the way of getting there is what I liked most about the article.
As I mentioned in a previous blog (Is Free Software Communist? Maybe Yes...), the information economy is so different from the material economy (mainly due to the loss of the conservation of number) that a lot of the assumptions implicit in what we call "economic theory" (but which is really only "material economic theory") fail utterly when applied to the economics of producing information products. The theory frequently predicts the exact opposite of what really happens. When that happens, you don't need a few tweaks. You need a new theory.
The weirdest thing for me, though, was that one of the people reading this article concluded that open source developers are exploited by companies which promote and sell open source software based products. Well, in a technical sense, this is probably true -- they are using the software as a resource and making money from it.
Why is it that open source developers don't feel "exploited"?
My first reaction was to be utterly taken aback (I think the technical term here is "Facepalm!"), but how to articulate that reaction?
Why is it that open source developers don't feel "exploited"? Is it because they're just naive or too desperate to notice? I don't think so.
The truth is, they are all getting the product of the collaboration, and that is generally far more valuable to them than any money that might be made off of it. The main reason to contribute to the development of a piece of free software is that you want to be able to use it. Collaborating on its production is a cheap way to get that, especially if you are already a programmer.
So, the funny thing is, most programmers probably don't even stop to think of what is being "taken" from them, but rather of what they are "given" by the project -- for which their contribution often seems like a rather small cost. Add to this the satisfaction of the work itself, of seeing your contribution make a difference in the world, to say nothing of the gain in reputation among your peers, and it's not exploitation that most contributors feel. Rather they are more likely to feel it's "too good to be true" and fear that they are exploiting others.
Or as some people have described it: you give a brick and you get back a building.
So where does that fit into the economic worldview?
Capitalism is not the only way to organize big projects!
Capitalism is not the only way to organize big projects! In fact, it has particular weaknesses, due to the way it operates on fundamentally selfish motivations. When the goal is something that helps the whole society without showing any favoritism, capitalist businesses have nothing to sell. And that puts them in an awkward situation. But of course, such goals are among the highest any civilization can aspire to. So, while capitalism helps us solve lots of little problems that need solving, it can make the biggest and most important problems unattainable.
Our capitalist society has come up with two broad approaches to deal with that:
1 - Artificial Scarcity
One is to artificially create (usually fictitious or intangible) things to sell so that capitalist enterprises can make money selling them and otherwise operate more or less as intended. In this mode we have "carbon credits", "intellectual property", or "private health insurance". Even relatively tangible things like electrical power or phone service work in this way in practice, because of the need to share power distribution and data lines (otherwise the landscape would be cluttered with redundant power and telephone poles and every right-of-way would be crammed full of redundant cables -- at enormous cost to society).
This is the type of strategy that traditional copyright law adopts, by creating an intangible "good" in the "rights" to publish a work (which are otherwise reserved under a state-supported monopoly. This was an okay system for a long time, but it's increasingly clear that it is not an adequate system for the 21st century.
2 - Socialize Production
The other is to create a non-profit organization (NPO) or a government to manage the project. From this comes things like "NASA" or "public education" or the military. These organizations collect their money either voluntarily (NPO) or coercively (government, via taxes), and the money is used to support their costs.
An awful lot of the raging political polemics in US politics are between proponents of the two different systems. For myself, I'll say this: they both can work, they both have drawbacks, and it would probably be foolish to assume that one or the other is always the best solution.
Neither of these really fits the open source free software model very well.
However, I skipped an important option. Well, I didn't really, because I was telling you what "our capitalist society" has come up with. This third option isn't really capitalist, even though it often winds up being lumped with the "NPO" solution, and it is much older:
3 - Have a Barn Raising
That solution is to just do it. People get together in large groups or small and they contribute their time. Typically, they don't get paid. Ever volunteer in a soup kitchen? Ever help a friend move into a new house? Ever help your neighbor get their computer working? This is the gift economy, and in the world of intellectual production it is a great deal more important.
The reason it's not so important in the material world is because it's limited. You can give away a hammer you're not using anymore, but that only helps one person. And it hurts you -- you don't have the hammer anymore. It's easy to see that this kind of gift economy is pretty limited in what it can do. So this never gets very far in the material economy, and economist have been safe to ignore it for most purposes, or treat it as a footnote which explains minor deviations.
But what if what you gave your friend wasn't material? What if it were, say, a recipe for really good cornbread? Or the tacit knowledge of how to use a hammer to build a house? In doing that, you haven't lost anything. Your friend gained. And what's more, you can give that away again. So can your friend. If it's really good cornbread, your entire community may know how to make it in a month or two. You will have had a major impact on the entire community. That might be a thousand people. Or a billion. Either way, the cost to you is not only the same, it's negligible.
Not only that, but you might not even have to make your special cornbread any more -- you could pay somebody else for the service of making it for you. That's a new option for you, and it comes without removing your right to make your own cornbread if you want to.
So Where's the Exploitation?
Some people would like to claim that the company making your cornbread is "exploiting" you. Well, that would obviously make sense if the company forced you to buy their version of your cornbread. But they can't do that if the cornbread recipe isn't property.
Nor can they stop you from starting your own company and selling your cornbread.
Plus, as the real originator of the recipe, you can give your own company your endorsement -- "Come and buy the real cornbread from the real source."
It's not the sense that someone is making money off of your work that makes you feel "exploited"; it's the sense that they are taking advantage of some disparity to do so
You see it's not the sense that someone is making money off of your work that makes you feel "exploited"; it's the sense that they are taking advantage of some disparity to do so. But free software licenses -- particularly copyleft licenses like the GNU General Public License -- ensure a degree of parity. No one can keep you from sharing your work (or the work of all the other developers who collaborated with you) away from you. No one can keep you from using it. Nor even from offering your own services based on it.
So, ultimately the sense is that you could make more money from it if you wanted to, and that the companies who succeed at this (mainly because they are good at marketing) are earning their keep.
The possibility of direct competition also tends to keep those companies pretty lean, so we're really not worried about them suddenly becoming an unproductive impediment to progress the way proprietary software companies can.
Finally, there's a direct benefit from this kind of marketing: those companies bring more people to the project, and more people usually translates to more collaborators -- either because some of those people are developers, or because they inspire companies to pay other programmers to build on what you created already, thus subsidizing your project.
So, really, the whole thing is a win-win scenario, and it's hard to imagine feeling exploited in this.
Licensing Notice
This work may be distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, version 3.0, with attribution to "Terry Hancock, first published in Free Software Magazine". Illustrations and modifications to illustrations are under the same license and attribution, except as noted in their captions (all images in this article are CC By-SA 3.0 compatible).


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HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! T. B. Joshua Celebrates 56th Birthday, 20 Facts You May Not Know About The Prophet
T. B. is a Nigerian Pastor , (born June 12, 1963) Televangelist and Philanthropist. He is the founder of The Synagogue, Church of All Nations (SCOAN), Emmanuel TV television station from Lagos.
Happy Birthday Prophet TB Joshua – 56th Birthday Challenge
June, 12
We at Voice of Dominion wish Pastor TB Joshua a happy 56th birthday! I can sincerely that my life has not remained the same since meeting Pastor Joshua. I know when I write a book of my journey through life, it will begin with the words: "The day I met Pastor TB Joshua…" Thank you, sir!
We say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Prophet Temitope Balogun Joshua, the man of the Synagogue. On his birthday, see 20 things you may not have known about Prophet TB Joshua.
- #1) Prophet TB Joshua was born on June 12, 1963. He is 56 years old today.
- #2) He stayed in his mother's womb for fifteen months and was finally delivered at Egbe Medical Center, Kogi State, Nigeria after being taken from one hospital to another when the pregnancy was due for delivery.
- #3) On the 7th day after birth, during his naming ceremony; a piece of rock flew from a rock blasting site, pierce through the roof of the house he was kept and landed at the exact place he was lying. No one knew how he was moved from that position before the stone dropped. The mother fainted and went into a coma as a result of the incident.
- #4) As a result of how he was miraculously saved from death during his naming ceremony, he was called different names: Temi –tope, –oluwa, –dire, – dayo, etc. but the mum decided to go with Temitope (meaning "Mine is worthy of thanks".)
- #5) He was born into a very humble background in Arigidi, Ondo State, South West Nigeria.
- #6) The name of his father was G.K. Balogun. He passed away when he was still a baby. Consequently, the family's responsibilities rest entirely on the mum.
- #7) At a little age, he would be taken to church by his mum and taught how to be involved in God's project.
- #8) He was the smallest boy in his class, but always led prayers.
- #9) He was famously called "Small Pastor" in school due to his closeness to God.
- #10) His education suffered epileptic fits: Had attended six colleges in less than one year.
- #11) He started his college journey at Ansa-Ud-Deen Grammar School, Ikare-Akoko, Ondo State, Nigeria.
- #12 He was also a pioneer student at the Muslim College, Ikotun, Lagos.
- #13 He started his ministry with eight members in Ikotun Egbe, Lagos under a shade at the same location where the SCOAN is today.
- #14 During leisure, he plays with birds in his garden. Sometimes, he eats with them, and other times, the birds would climb on him while he sleeps. He is a man of nature. He preaches that you can read God's Word anywhere to teach others but to read and live by it, you must learn to read it in nature away from all forms of distractions.
- #15 During the early days of his ministry, he was actively involved in every building work of the church from digging the drainage, cleaning chairs in the church, taking Sunday school classes with little children, to serving food to the congregation. He is a humble and hardworking man.
- #16 Most of TB Joshua's messages during Sunday service at the SCOAN centers on building faith in God, and the need to love our neighbors. His favorite quote is, "We are sons and daughters of love. Let love leads."
- #17 He gives prophecies to individuals and nations, heals and delivers people from demonic influences using the name of Jesus.
- #18 Every Sunday, TB Joshua's church witness visitors from all over the world including places such as Vietnam, Argentina, Australia, Germany, USA, South Korea, Wales, Trinidad & Tobago, etc.
- #19 TB Joshua is also a Philanthropist with many around the world under scholarship sponsored by Him. Many times, he responds through the EmmanuelTV (a Christian television channel owned by SCOAN) to emergency situations around the world, e.g., Ecuador's earthquake, the hurricane in the USA, etc.
- #20 Prophet TB Joshua is married to Evelyn Joshua. Bless with three daughters (Serah, Promise & Heart)
June, 12
Today, June 12th 2019, T.B. Joshua turns 56 years old!!! Please drop your birthday message or greeting in the COMMENTS below and remember what the man of God said on Sunday concerning how God wants us to celebrate this special occasion:
Birthday Message From Prophet TB Joshua
"If you really love your pastor, you should dedicate June 12th to take your time to meet the sick ones, to have friends who have been bedridden for many years. There will be no gathering, no coming together to cut a cake. On June 12th, rededicate yourself to the acts of giving. When you do that, your destiny will be reshaped. The love you give away is the ONLY love you keep…" – T.B. Joshua
Written by Kum Eric Tso
Brother Eric is the vision bearer of Voice of Dominion Ministries Int'l, a minister of the Gospel and renown online entrepreneur. Voice of dominion is committed to revealing Jesus and restoring dominion to Man. We believe when Jesus is revealed, destinies are restored. We believe Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. We believe God still performs miracles today.


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You da man Denco, that's bad azz!!! I'm up 201% on my phot play, rat holing that!!! I think the first quarter CC's are gonna run the green stocks. imo Colorado is making a killing!!!
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You da man Denco, that's bad azz!!! I'm up 201% on my phot play, rat holing that!!! I think the first quarter CC's are gonna run the green stocks. imo Colorado is making a killing!!!
Glad to see your post PJ! Hope things been going good for you!!! Let's get this $4.10 by Friday!!! I said it:money:
I'm not even gonna take the crow out of the freezer!!!:wizard:
Even tho, I know, their's a lot of people that wants me to eat some, I've ate my share!!! It's time to pass the plate!!! LOL
I say we top out around 4.20 4.25 then settle to 4.00 4.10. What did they say Liberty's range to buy was? $4.18-$3.?
If Meyers hasn't been buying at these lows, I'll be pissed!!! Tomorrow is gonna tell the tale!!!
RC...don't think we go lower. NO WAY! Just don't think it's gona be a huge short squeeze...we could go to 4.15 -.25 no problem. Who knows WHAT Myers is gona saw tomorrow. Prolly nothing . Maybe what's his face knows that this is gona be a blowout CC and wanted to get in front of it.
All I know is I followed WOLFs advice and waited til PM and sold some! What's next wolf?!
does anyone here honestly think they are smarter than malone?
I say not; for one simple reason: Malone has the brains & Billion$ to pull off his plan.
If he gets a higher share price for his SiriusXM stock he'll have to pay taxes! Malone's entire carrier has been avoiding taxes. Besides if Malone wants to consolidate the pay-tv industry he is better off with SiriusXM as a wholly own subsidiary versus being paid off by some white knight outright buying SiriusXM. I simply think Malone wants a deal to go through. I for one will vote for the deal because I've made a higher percentage off my year ago investment in LCMA than I have with my year ago Siri!!!! Over the pass year Malone has returned a higher gain than SiriusXM. I was really shocked when I did the calculations. For reference see my early post in this thread this morning (#15 around 9am).
Well it would appear the shorts are still covering today. Already exceeded daily average volume after being open only an hour.
for a good laugh (was he paid by LCMA) :LOL:
Cough, Cough ---> "internet Radio" and "telematics?" Hmmm... Sponsored Data services? Hmmm...
"10:39 AM EST, 01/07/2014 (MT Newswires) -- Tesla (TSLA) and AT&T(T) have agreed on a multi-year exclusive arrangement under which current and future Tesla vehicles will be equipped with high-speed wireless connectivity.
With the internet, the internet in the cars will power remote engine diagnostics, telematics, and infotainment features such as Internet radio, Web browsing, live traffic, weather and navigation through a 17-inch touchscreen.
TSLA was lower 0.16% in mid-morning trade. T was higher 0.20% at $35.03."
Howard Stern talking Siri right now.
3.85 in play..... a hold here would be nice.
Attachment 1246
The thought is... unless the committee convinces Malone to scrap the "ratio" offer all together, I don't see Sirius XM going much higher from the current price. Think about it... so the committee asks for a more favorable ratio for Sirius XM shareholders, it then becomes less favorable for LMCA shareholders thus driving the stock price down which drives down the offer price. It's a wash. Sirius XM is trading at a 6.35% premium right now.
EDIT: In reality it is all SMOKENMIRRORS BS


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Life with Dempsey, a blonde Labrador retriever with a soft round head, has changed for Kevan and Sheila Cunningham. The trio once hiked on conservation land near their home in Southeastern Massachusetts. They relaxed in front of the TV as Dempsey curled up in his own chair. They took vacations as a family and slept together in a big bed.
The Cunninghams got the dog when the Lab was 8 weeks old, and they still refer to Dempsey as their "baby." Fourteen years later the puppy is 98 in human years. Senior Dempsey, arthritic and failing, can't climb stairs anymore, jump up to the bed, or ride in the car. The beloved pooch has good days and bad.
"He's hanging in there," says Cunningham, a judge with the Taunton District Court. "But every day is a little bit different. He does like to get outside and watch the world and he barks occasionally. It's an elderly type of bark but he still manages to croak one out."
Living with an elder of any species is heartbreaking, gratifying, uplifting, and patience-trying. Old dogs have an especially deep emotional pull when they peer up with their sweet, sad, trusting eyes.
"It's so hard to live with an elderly dog because it's like a roller coaster, up and down all the time," says Dr. Lisa Moses, chief of the Pain Medicine Service at Angell Animal Medical Center. The subject is personal for Moses. She has a 16-year-old pit bull, Dora. "What they used to be able to do, what their life used to be like, it's really hard to set that aside."
Singer Fiona Apple made headlines last week for postponing the South American leg of her tour so she can stay by the side of her ailing, nearly-14-year-old pit bull, Janet. In an eloquent and lengthy letter to her fans, Apple explained how important this time with her beloved pet is: ". . . I know she is coming close to the time where she will stop being a dog, and start instead to be part of everything. She'll be in the wind, and in the soil, and the snow, and in me, wherever I go. I just can't leave her now, please understand. If I go away again, I'm afraid she'll die and I won't have the honor of singing her to sleep, of escorting her out. . ."
The Globe's Brian McGrory wrote a 2004 column, "The Brown Eyes of Wisdom," an elegy to his golden retriever Harry in the final act. The lead sentence is a weeper: "They should come with a warning label, these creatures. They should come with a label that says you're going to fall hopelessly in love, only to have your heart shattered before you could ever possibly prepare." Kevan Cunningham keeps a clipping of the column close.
Old dogs touch a nerve — and the pocketbook. With an eye on burgeoning market possibilities of the senior set, canine product purveyors sell specially formulated kibble, beds, bowls, ramps to get up into the car, harnesses, diapers for incontinence, as well as various supplements, herbs and holistic remedies designed to cosset a senior dog through its last years. Doting owners find it difficult to resist the pitch for anything to help their four-legged family member.
The Cunninghams bought a large therapeutic bed for Dempsey. They changed to a food for senior dogs. On days he shuns the kibble, Sheila makes chicken soup. The Cunninghams lined the tile floor of their kitchen with rubber mats so Dempsey doesn't slip. They give him fish oil, glucosamine and chondroitin, supplements thought to assuage arthritis. Their veterinarian prescribed a pain medication, which seems to help. Yet, as with every dog, Dempsey has a simple go-to obsession having nothing to do with fancy or expensive: "Bread," says Kevan Cunningham. "Any kind of bread."
Jon Comeau, product development specialist for dogs at Vermont's Orvis Company, says his company's market expands with the aging dog population.
"We see it in the sales figures that come through," he says. "Ten years ago, we were selling products to keep dogs off the couch. Now we're selling products to keep them on the couch."
Beds are big sellers for elderly dogs with creaky joints. "We have several versions of Tempur-Pedic and regular memory-foam beds," says Comeau, who touts the advantages of rectangular beds for stiff dogs who won't curl up because of the pain. Orvis, which claims to have sold the first dog bed in 1976, also sells absorbent covers for incontinence.
According to the latest statistics from a survey of pet owners by the American Pet Products Association (APPA), there are 78.2 million dogs in US households. The numbers give no breakout figures for how many senior dogs are out there but veterinarians and other experts anecdotally agree canines are living longer because of advances in veterinary care, better food, and heightened owner awareness about how to keep a dog healthier longer.
"We've seen a real change in the overall life span," says Dr. Moses.
What is considered geriatric in a dog? The actuarial table depends on size. For small dogs, old age begin after 10. For bigger dogs, after age "8 or 9," according to Moses, and for "giant breeds (Great Dane, St. Bernard) at 5 or 6."
Anne Shuhler of Watertown got a jolt when her veterinarian made an offhand remark while examining her "genuine mutt" Sawyer.
"When Sawyer was 8, the vet said something like, 'Oh well, he's a senior now.' " Shuhler wasn't ready for the reckoning. "At the age of 8 I hadn't really thought of him that way. I thought dogs were old at 12 to 15. I know they don't live forever but I hadn't moved him into that mental place."
Since then, Shuhler has made her peace and now refers to Sawyer, a 10½-year-old with shades of German shepherd and collie, as her "old man." The two hiked in the White Mountains of New Hampshire not long ago.
Admitting age is a human denial trigger, which owners can extend to un-self-conscious dogs. Cristen Underwood, director of marketing for the Quaker Pet Group, says the company's "Silver Tails" products for senior dogs didn't sell well at Petco, the pet store chain, because "people don't want to admit their dog is getting older. It's hard to make that change into buying senior pet products."
Underwood says the Silver Tails line, which includes mats with bamboo charcoal inserts to warm furry bodies and infrared massagers, will now go into "boutique" stores where dog keepers have more of a connection to the sales staff.
Yet, Rob Van Sickle, co-owner of the Polka Dog Bakery in Boston's South End and Jamaica Plain, says any marketing pitch for dogs through their owners can be foolhardy.
"I was just at a trade show in Las Vegas and people were walking around with white poodles that had been tie-dyed," he says. "There always seems to be a new marketing pitch." Van Sickle calls the pet industry a "giant marketing engine and everybody's always trying to build a better mousetrap."
Unfortunately, no product will make an old dog live forever. And the owner of a senior dog ultimately confronts the grief of loss. Dr. Moses of Angell empathizes. "People who are devoted to elderly animals are very special people," she says. "They do the best they can to make their dogs' lives better for however long they have."
For Kevan Cunningham, it's simple. He wants to do anything for Dempsey because the old dog gives everything back. "He is so mellow and peaceful and just wants to please us," says Cunningham. "He's still there to greet us with a tail wag."
Monica Collins can be reached at


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Sign up now to stream Delinquent Hamsters Season 2, subs, tons of dubs, OVA's, simulcasts, plus the all new Dubcast℠ editions and more!
The cushion strikes again and drains the hamsters of their usual rebellious energy. What would it take for them to break free from its dastardly clutches?
Regent, Mohawk and Kohai get new digs in time for a new season. Time to take the delinquency up a notch!
Why does the hamsters' new place smell weird? It rubs them the wrong way, that's for sure. Looks like they gotta set things right…
Time for open house tours! How do delinquent hamsters decorate? Let's find out.
The hamsters have new digs, but do they need a new character to really make this feel like Season 2? The delinquents discuss.
Gramps and Grams pay the delinquents a visit, and the delinquents have a LOT of questions. Perhaps too many to fit in just one episode…
Time to get to know Grams! She's quite the inspiring hamster.
Are the hams forgetting something? Maybe Namippo? Or someone else? No, no, there's no way…
How are the hams supposed to use a sofa, anyway? They should definitely start by claiming a spot, that's for sure.
No more escaping, huh? Time for the hams to take up a new coping mechanism.
Samurai hamster Kiyomasa is still looking for a sword. Perhaps the delinquents can help him find his destined blade.
Kohai's perm has gone haywire! Time to take drastic measures to tame the beast.
The delinquents set their sights on a delicious looking book, but they'll have to be sneaky to claim their prize.
The cushion strikes again and drains the hamsters of their usual rebellious energy. What would it take for them to break free from its dastardly clutches?
Gramps stops by to play a game of tag… but wait. What's his real name again? Does Gramps even remember?
Every good delinquent needs a war story or two. Kohai's may just outshine them all. Time to get the dirt!
When the cat's away, the mice will play… or the hamsters will play, in this case. Same difference.
Whoever finds the coolest spot on the sofa is the boss… too bad no one can decide where that spot actually is.
Should the hams chill out on the cursing? How does one become a better delinquent, anyhow? The hamsters discuss.
Rugby is pretty cool. Do the hamsters even know the rules? Eh, whatever. It'll be fine…
There's a new bird in town and Namippo isn't happy about it.
Are the hamsters actually night owls? Real delinquents don't take naps!
Regents wants to learn to whistle. Can Mohawk and Kohai teach him how?
Kinkuma needs to go big or go home if he wants to pass his art class, but it's hard for him to draw things he doesn't care about. Maybe he should draw his hams!
There's an interloper in the hams' midst, and it really gets their gourd.
Kohai is thinking of becoming a "mild" delinquent. Whatever that's supposed to mean.
Twee-Phoenix has an impressive name. Do they live up to it? Is it even their name? This is confusing…
Mohawk falls for fall. Or he would, if it would actually get here... This conversation sure is taking a while…
Mohawk's tissues are missing. Regent helps find them. He is an ace detective, you see.
The beacons are lit! Kiyomasa calls for aid!
Mohawk and Regent have been robbed! There's only one possible culprit… isn't there? An investigation has begun!
The birds seem to be friendly all of a sudden… or does their cheerful mood conceal a darker truth? Dun dun DUN!
Tensions are running high amongst the hams, but that's nothing a little Chris Moose cheer can't fix.
Grams and Gramps reminisce. They remember a lot from over the years, but will they remember they have an audience?
The delinquents need fancy finishing moves to use the next time they get in a fight. Time to brainstorm!
Kohai takes a nap and has a really strange dream. Like… it's weird as heck, y'all. What is even happening!?
All Regent wants is a little PEACE and QUIET! Too bad he lives with such rowdy hams… maybe he can calm them down a little?
Mohawk finally has someone he can whistle with! Time to relax and enjoy the song.
The hams wax poetic on the subject of fruit, but which ones are their favs? The hams debate!
Kohai tries to improve his nonverbal communication skills, much to the other hams' confusion.
The Bro-o-Lantern returns! That means Halloween is almost here. Time for a costume competition to celebrate the spookiest of seasons!
Regent wants to hold a press conference, but what the heck are press conferences even for, anyway?
Merry Chris Moose! The hams present their presents to one another and celebrate another year together.
Welcome to Delinquent Lingo 101 with your instructor, Kohai the delinquent hamster!
The A/C doesn't seem to be working properly, and the hams are feeling the heat… or the lack of it, to be specific. Why is it so COLD!?
The Grand-1 Grand Prix is underway, and the hams are off to the races to prove they're the ultimate grandkid!
Regent and Mohawk take their playtime very seriously, so while they goof off, Kohai will take some time for selfcare.
The delinquent hams teach Kiyomasa the fine art of doing nothing at all.
The siren song of fame is calling, but what will the delinquent hamsters have to do to become stars? Does Smartphone Bro hold the answers?
A fight erupts… kind of. The hams are voice training and it's confusing for Kohai. Hopefully they don't yell too loudly and destroy their throats.
Life has been pretty lowkey lately, so Regent wants a new rival. But where the heck can a ham get a new rival on short notice?


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Major automakers reported across-the-board gains in cars sales in May, the latest sign of a rebound in consumer demand for big ticket items.
Combined U.S. sales figures from General Motors, Ford Motor, Chrysler Group and Toyota Motor were up 7% from a year ago and nearly 12% from the April sales total. Each automaker's sales were either in-line or slightly better than most forecasts for the month.
Ford Motor (F) used the sales report to announce it was increasing its third quarter production by 10% at its North American plants. The company reported sales up 14% from a year ago, led by a 30% jump in sales for its F-Series pickup truck, its best-selling vehicle. Ford said it was the best month for F-Series sales in six years.
"May car sales are coming in a tad stronger than predicted, driven by a significant rebound in full-size pickup trucks sales due to a recovering construction market," said Michelle Krebs, senior analyst with Edmunds.com.
GM (GM) reported the most modest sales gain of any of the automakers, rising only 3.1%. But that was because of a drop in fleet sales to businesses such as rental car companies and government purchases. Sales to consumers were up nearly 9% to give GM its best overall sales month since the financial sector meltdown in September 2008.
The string of record stock market highs during the month is one factor driving strong auto sales said Alec Gutierrez, senior analyst at Kelley Blue Book.
Related: Signs GM is firing on all cylinders
"As the stock market improved, that helped lift confidence and get people back into the market place," he said. "Credit is also more widely available. Even those without perfect credit can get loans without having to pay much higher rates."
Sales at Chrysler Group were up 11%, and while Toyota (TM) sales were only modestly higher than a year ago, they were up 18% from the weak April sales results.
Sales tracker Autodata released a monthly sales estimate for electric car maker Tesla Motors (TSLA) for the first time with this report, putting its U.S. sales in the month at 1,425 cars, or just 0.2% of the market. Tesla only releases global quarterly sales figures, not the monthly U.S. sales that other automakers report.
Overall industry U.S. sales came in at an annual pace of 15.3 million in the month, up 8% from a year ago, according to Autodata. It was a good rebound from April's annual car sales pace of 14.9 million vehicles. April was the first time in since October that the sales pace fell just short of the 15 million mark. But even that step back in car sales in April put industry-wide sales 8.5% above year-earlier levels.


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For media inquiries, please contact Media Relations
"To me music has profound qualities; it is incredibly inspirational. I say to my classes, 'I want to believe that music grabbed you by the shirt, threw you up against the wall, and said, "You're going to pay attention to me."' But in a harmony or sight singing class, they may think, 'This is not what grabbed me by the shirt.' To show that what they're learning has a tremendous role in the aesthetic experience is vital."
"Given all the constructs we have to deliver, it would be easy to walk into class and throw a list up on the board. But I'd rather start with a piece of music and ask, 'What colors do you see? When you hear this section, what does it feel like?' I want to start with that tangible connection and then say, 'Okay, now let's look at the chords, or the relationship between the melody and the harmony.'"
"One of my favorite examples is a great piece of music, John Coltrane's 'Moment's Notice.' The melody is incredibly simple—it's mostly a major scale, all diatonic. But when you marry it with his harmony, it becomes this whole other world. He aligns it with this hypervigilant chord progression moving through implied keys, the tempo is fast, and it becomes a tour de force. Therein lies the beauty and the magic of great composers and great improvisers: they know how to take the obvious and bring it to another level."
"My students ask, 'Do you really think composers think of all these things?' No, they don't have to, because they already know them. They're dealing with their composition immediately on the aesthetic level, instead of going through the thought level. But students are still sharpening the edges of their knives."
"Music touches all the same sensibilities that we struggle with every day; the things we surround ourselves with; the things we try to become a part of, avoid, or transcend. Life—like a unified piece of music—is about balance: the relationships between dissonance and consonance. And music—like life—is a journey. If you allow it to lead you, you'll go to beautiful places."


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AVP Facilitators, please submit your community workshop listings here! Your listing will be reviewed and added to the calendar promptly. Do not list prison workshops. If you are a visitor, and would like to take a workshop in prison or the community, please contact your nearest council or AVP CA for more information.
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Paul Simon and Sting Will Tour Together in 2014
Paul Simon and Sting will tour North America together next year. According to The New York Times, the pair will officially announce the shows tomorrow, with, presumably, details of cities and dates.
For now, the former New York City neighbors have revealed only that they will be playing 18 dates together between Feb. 8 and March 16, 2014. More dates are expected to be announced. "Paul and I both share this abiding curiosity about music and where it's going," Sting told the New York Times. "We don't really know where this is going. We don't really have a clue how this is going to pan out."
Apparently the tour -- titled Paul Simon & Sting: On Stage Together -- is more of a greatest-hits kinda thing rather than an opportunity for each artist to showcase new music (Simon's most recent work is from 2011; Sting, on the other hand, has a new album out). In addition to performing their own songs, Simon and Sting will play some of their favorites together.
In May, they played Simon's 'The Boxer' and Sting's 'Fields of Gold' together during a benefit show. That planted the seeds for next year's tour, Simon said. "After we finished it, we both looked at each other and said, 'Wow. That's pretty interesting,'" he said.
But they've known each other for a far longer period. The singer-songwriters lived in the same New York building years ago. Sting joked that "for 20 years, this guy would be borrowing things all the time. Then I heard he was a songwriter."
Each artist will be backed by his regular band onstage. Tickets for some of the concerts are expected to go on sale on Wednesday (Nov. 6).


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Welcome to Boon Flair Pedestal High Chair Giveaway
Hosted by Miss FrugalMommy & Sponsored by Pish Posh Baby
About The Boon Flair Pedestal High Chair"The Boon Flair Pedestal High Chair is an exclusive feeding seat with a sophisticated pneumatic lift system. Its chemical-resistant, waterproof pad provides a soft cushion and can be easily removed for cleaning. The Boon highchair is equipped with an adjustable-position, compact tray, as well as top-quality safety features including a five-point harness and restraining post. The sturdy pedestal base gives Flair a unique form that is easy to clean and that slides smoothly under tables. The Boon High chair glides in any direction on six urethane casters that will not scratch floors, while the hands-free braking system easily locks the chair in place. Boon's neat lift allows for continuous height positioning, making it easy to adjust the seat to the perfect height."
You can discover more about this amazing high chair in Miss Frugal Mommy's review! Now for the exciting part! One lucky fan is going to win their very own Boon Flair Pedestal High Chair in Gray/Lime! This giveaway is open to US residents 18 and older. Enter to win in the giveaway tools below, all entries will be verified, one entrant per household or you will immediately be disqualified. Winner will be contacted via email and has 48 hours to respond before a new winner is chosen. Prize fulfillment is the responsibility of the sponsor and not the participating bloggers. Good Luck!!!


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MCHS Ladies Cross Country is Runner-Up in State Meet
The Macon County Ladies Cross Country Team competed in the State Cross Country Meet held Saturday November 3rd at Percy Warner Park in Nashville. The team finished as State A-AA Runner Up.
Many had high hopes for the squad this year. Last year this squad finished in 3rd place at the state meet, which was the best place by a Macon boys or girls squad. MCHS won the Region 5 A-AA meet on October 27th at the same course they would compete for the state title.
When time came for the girls to run, over 180 runners toed the line in 85 degree heat, a real hot race for this time of year. Twenty-three teams from the eight regions in Tennessee entered seven runners. Of the seven runners squads score the top five finishers based on the place they finish the race. Runners who are competing on an individual basis do not factor in the team competition. Teams want as few points as possible.
MCHS Coach Glen Gattis was hopeful. "We were hoping that our girls could possibly run just a little bit faster than they did at Region last week. In really hot conditions, for the most part that is what they did. They ran some really good times."
MCHS finished as the State Runner-up in A-AA. The Top ten team scores were: CAK 96, MCHS 100, Obion Co 124, Stone Memorial 156, Trinity Christian 156, Central Magnet 187, Signal Mountain 195, Notre Dame 201, Greeneville 209, and USJ 281. Macon was the only A-AA team to place more than one runner in the top 15.
Individual times for MCHS were: Katie Swindle 20:56 (7th), Katie Hix 21:03 (8th), Jasmine Chaparro 21:31 (13th), Logan Hernandez 22:56 (28th), Maddy Miller 25:08 (90th), Jessica Seehafer 26:18 (120), and Alysia Givins 26:50 (130).
"I am extremely proud of our girls. We will miss Senior Katie Hix but have everybody else coming back. I hope these girls can see just what running those tough races in early August can do for you," commented Coach Gattis.
Congratulations to the MCHS Girls Cross Country State A-AA Runner-Up team.


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VIDEO - Police are investigating whether anti-Semitism was behind a brutal attack early Thursday on Tottenham fans out drinking ahead of their team's Europa League match against Lazio. At least one person was stabbed and seven were taken to the hospital, police and witnesses said.
In an apparently well-organized assault, some 50 masked hooligans wielding cobblestones, metal bars and knives attacked the British fans and trashed the "The Drunken Ship" pub in Rome's Campo de' Fiori square, a popular drinking spot where Tottenham fans had gathered on the eve of the game.
Video courtesy of JewishNewsOne
Lazio fans were widely suspected, but the club said Thursday there was no proof its supporters were involved and the ANSA news agency reported that one supporter from crosstown rival AS Roma had been arrested. In a statement, Lazio noted that the hooligans' faces were covered, insisted that its fans had been behaving recently and called for a full investigation.
Tottenham supporters are often called the "Yid Army" and the team is known to have a large Jewish fan base from north London. Lazio fans are traditionally right-wing and often use fascist salutes and slogans. Witnesses said the hooligans shouted "Jew" during the attack.
Rome Mayor Gianni Alemanno called for tough justice for those responsible for what he called a "terrible and disgusting" attack. "The anti-Semitic hypothesis increases the seriousness of the aggression," he said in a statement.
Rome police say they detained some of the 50 or so attackers, but acknowledged many got away. Fifteen people were identified and searches were under way Thursday at their homes, police said in a statement.
Blood stained the cobblestones outside the bar, windows and mirrors were smashed and stools and tables were overturned.
"They penned them in the back and they threw everything at them: cobblestones, metal rods, metal bolts, pieces of belts," bar owner Marco Manzi told The Associated Press after returning to survey the damage Thursday morning.
He said the attack seemed well organized, with groups converging on the pub from two directions, their faces covered with motorcycle helmets and scarves, and armed with "every possible thing."
'Nothing to do with football'
The brawl began sometime after 1 am and was over within 20 minutes, Manzi said. Police said those hospitalized were British men, aged 20-60. One emerged from the hospital Thursday afternoon with a black eye and a bandaged head and foot.
Manzi claimed police were virtually absent from the brawl, though police disputed that and officials noted that pubs have their own private security. Often a police van or two is stationed just a few meters (yards) from "The Drunken Ship," since fights regularly break out in the piazza frequented at night by American exchange students, tourists and young Italians.
"There was a total absence of law enforcement," Manzi said.
He said after the brawl ended inside the pub, the attackers escaped and knifed another victim about 20 meters away, down a small cobblestone street.
Police said in their statement that their patrol units on duty in Campo de' Fiori alerted headquarters as soon as the fight broke out and that "all available patrols," an ambulance and police reinforcements were quickly sent.
Lazio said it hoped those responsible would be quickly identified so that its fans wouldn't be subject to "unjust" suspicions.
"Lazio fans have shown in recent times to have totally abandoned shows of cowardice and gratuitous physical violence," it said in a statement. "Episodes like what happened last night have nothing to do with football."


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October 2, 2010
Google Acquires BlindType to Improve Android's Virtual Keyboard
Singularity Hub found that BlindType's application "knows what you meant to type, even if you make mistakes. Lots of them. In fact, you can type without looking at the screen at all."
Unfortunately, the application is not available in the Android Market or the iTunes App Store, but it will certainly be used to improve Android's virtual keyboard.
{ via Mashable }
12 comments:
BlindType seems like a toy. Swype/SlideIt are a much better solution.ReplyDelete
My hopes of seeing BlindType on the iPhone are dwindling.
Also, I'm guessing that the only way to do a system-wide replacement of the keyboard on the iPhone would require jailbreaking.
- AnonymousOctober 2, 2010 at 6:27 PM
@Brian where do you buy your drugs?ReplyDelete
@Caspy7 Android is better anyway. I felt the same way when I heard Apple acquired Siri.
Cool.. but I'm afraid that this system also relies on a dictionary. Making it useless for those that type in multiple languages (anyone that doesn't speak English only), or simply for every day typing where text gets a lot more creative than in those clean cut demo texts.ReplyDelete
We need more tech that supports multiple languages.. mixed in the same context.
It works for other languages than English, too.ReplyDelete
Hopefully Google will only let BlindType be Android-only keyboard and let iphone users jealous.ReplyDelete
- AnonymousOctober 4, 2010 at 4:40 AM
No don't let Google do what Apple does to others !!! No Evil
Being a touch typist, I can tell you that this is exactly what we need. You remember the relative placement of the keys, but you can't feel them on a touch screen unlike a physical keyboard, so you have to constantly look at the screen to get each letter right.ReplyDelete
With this you won't have to look at the keyboard. Heck, you won't even need the onscreen keyboard.
- AnonymousNovember 7, 2010 at 5:12 PM
WHERE IS BLIND TYPEEEEEEReplyDelete
- AnonymousJanuary 14, 2011 at 10:57 AM
I would like to see the keyboard handle non-english unicode based Indic languages like Telugu and Tamil. Android should provide a dynamic keybaorad to map the Upper/lower case keys for any language unicodes. Also Android should support OTC fonts and be able to change the Keyboard layout from English to Non-English on the fly.ReplyDelete
Madhu (email@example.com)
Anyone has answers please reply me.
- AnonymousMay 14, 2011 at 6:18 PM
@Brian "BlindType seems like a toy. Swype/SlideIt are a much better solution."ReplyDelete
Since you didn't say 'why' you regard it to be a toy, an assertion which isn't obvious to me, your post is pointless. BlindType is a keyboard with advanced error correction functionality - why does it seem like a toy to you?
- AnonymousOctober 15, 2011 at 1:09 PM
So a google backed version of swiftkey. Thats great. :-)ReplyDelete


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In an attempt to reduce the spread of COVID-19, B.C. drivers can now renew their licences online and defer Autoplan payments for up to 90 days.
In a March 24 news release, the Insurance Corp. of B.C. said customers can renew by calling 1-800-950-1498 up to six weeks in advance of their licences expiring. ICBC had already suspended road tests due to the novel cornavirus.
ICBC said customers who use the new phone service will be emailed an interim paper licence that will be valid for 90 days. The new remote service applies to routine renewals, licence reinstatements, and replacement of a lost licence. Expiring BC Services Cards and BC Identification Cards are not eligible for phone renewals.
For customers having trouble paying their car insurance amid the COVID-19 crisis, ICBC is offering 90-day payment deferrals, up from the 30 days previously offered.
Drivers can apply online at https://onlinebusiness.icbc.com/eforms/dotcom/jsp/ACG398.jsp or by calling 1-800-950-1498. ICBC is asking people who are able to defer payment online to do so and keep phone lines free for other urgent inquiries.
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(The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a Reuters journalist who is also a member of the Pulitzer Center's board of directors.)
Somewhere in the desert of eastern Syria, a militant from the Islamic State beheaded the American journalist James Foley this week. The killer and his terrorist group are responsible for Foley's death. They should be the focus of public anger.
But Foley's execution is also chilling a wake-up call for American and European policymakers, as well as U.S. news outlets and aid organizations. It is the clearest evidence yet of how vastly different responses to kidnappings by U.S. and European governments save European hostages but can doom the Americans. Hostages and their families realize this fully - even if the public does not.
"I wish I could have the hope of freedom and seeing my family once again, but that ship has sailed," Foley said moments before he was killed in a craven video released by the militant group on Tuesday. "I guess, all in all, I wish I wasn't American."
Foley clearly spoke under duress. But his regret at being an American captive, real or not, reflected grim fact.
This spring, four French and two Spanish journalists held hostage by the Islamic State extremists were freed - after the French and Spanish governments paid ransoms through intermediaries.
The U.S. government refused to negotiate or pay a ransom in Foley's case or for any other American captives - including my own abduction by the Taliban five years ago.
With the help of an Afghan journalist abducted with me, I was lucky enough to escape. But today Foley is dead and the Islamic State militants now say Steven Sotloff, a journalist for Time magazine whom the group also captured, will be killed if the United States does not stop bombing its fighters in Iraq.
There are no easy answers in kidnapping cases. The United States cannot allow terrorist groups to control its foreign policy.
One clear lesson that has emerged in recent years, however, is that security threats are more effectively countered by united American and European action. The divergent U.S. and European approach to abductions fails to deter captors or consistently safeguard victims.
Last month, a New York Times investigation found that al Qaeda and its direct affiliates had received at least $125 million in revenue from kidnappings since 2008 - primarily from European governments. In the last year alone, they received $66 million.
"Kidnapping hostages is an easy spoil," Nasser al-Wuhayshi, the leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, wrote in a 2012 letter to the leader of an al Qaeda affiliate in North Africa, "which I may describe as a profitable trade and a precious treasure."
Publicly, European governments deny making these payments. But former diplomats told the Times that ransoms have been paid through intermediaries.
Kidnapping as a fundraising tactic is thriving and rates are going up. In 2003, a ransom of roughly $200,000 was paid for each captive, the newspaper found. Today, captors reap millions per captive.
Abductions have become so lucrative that al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan help oversee negotiations for affiliates. Militants groups spread across North Africa, the Middle East and South Asia are now following the same rough protocol.
Hostage-taking by extremist groups is now so pervasive that at least one major aid organization is not sending U.S. aid workers to areas where they might be abducted. Instead, they are sending citizens from European countries with governments that will pay ransoms.
The cases have taken on a grim pattern: Hostages are abducted, months pass with no news from the captors and a threatening video or email is then sent to families. In some cases, the militants ask that cases not be made public so ransom can be paid quietly.
This was the case in Foley's tortuous, 21-month abduction. For the first 16 months after Foley was taken captive, his family had no information regarding his whereabouts. They learned he was alive from two Spanish journalists who were freed by the Islamic State in March after a ransom was paid.
In a subsequent email message, the captors instructed the family to keep the case quiet and not identify the Islamic State as the kidnappers. Fearing for Foley's life, the family obeyed. Other American families with loved ones taken captive by militants have done the same.
Privately, the Foleys and other families have grown intensely frustrated with the failure of American officials to negotiate with the captors. U.S. government officials also refused to coordinate their response in any way with European governments.
In the days and weeks ahead, the Foley family will speak for themselves about their ordeal. But the payment of ransoms and abduction of foreigners must emerge from the shadows. It must be publicly debated. American and European policymakers should be forced to answer for their actions.
Foley believed that his government would help him, according to his family. In a message that was not made public, Foley said that he believed so strongly that Washington would help that he refused to allow his fellow American captives to not believe in their government.
A consistent response to kidnapping by the U.S. and Europe is desperately needed. The current haphazard approach is failing.
James Foley must not die in vain.
(The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a Reuters journalist who is also a member of the Pulitzer Center's board of directors.)


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Prison inmate death after incident with staff ruled homicide
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) — The death of an inmate following an "altercation with correctional staff" at Western Illinois Correctional Center in May has been ruled a homicide, according to an autopsy report provided to The Associated Press under a Freedom of Information request.
Larry Earvin died from blunt trauma to the chest and abdomen, the death certificate from Clinton County in southern Illinois said. The 65-year-old Earvin sustained 15 rib fractures and two dozen or more abrasions, hemorrhages and lacerations. Surgery to remove a portion of his bowel appears to have followed the injury, the report says.
The FBI is investigating the May 17 incident at the prison in Mount Sterling, about 250 miles (400 kilometers) southwest of Chicago. Illinois Department of Corrections officials declined to disclose details of the altercation.
At least four Western Illinois employees were placed on administrative leave with pay on May 22, according to documents provided under the Freedom of Information Act. Suspended for allegedly violating conduct standards were correctional Sgt. Willie Hedden, 40, of Mount Sterling; correctional Lts. Benjamin Burnett, 33, of Winchester, and Blake Haubrich, 30, of Quincy and correctional officer Alex Banta, 27, of Quincy.
Earvin was black. The race of the officers allegedly involved in the altercation is uncertain.
Earvin, serving a six-year sentence for a Cook County robbery and scheduled for release in September, was airlifted to a regional hospital after the incident , Corrections spokeswoman Lindsey Hess said in July. He died six weeks after he was airlifted, on June 26, at Centralia Correctional Center, according to the death certificate signed by Clinton County Coroner Phillip Moss.
Moss declined comment. So did Dr. Gershom Norfleet, the St. Louis forensic pathologist who performed the autopsy with special agents from the FBI and Illinois State Police and a state police crime scene investigator attending.
Neither FBI spokesman Brad Ware nor Hess would comment on the autopsy.
"The IDOC (corrections department) has cooperated fully with federal authorities and, as per FBI policy, we are not allowed to discuss details regarding an investigation," Hess said in an email.
In addition to the broken ribs and multiple abrasions which showed signs of healing at the time of death, Earvin had pneumonia, a tracheostomy tube and a chest tube to drain fluids, all associated with chest trauma, according to Norfleet's findings. Under the heading "blunt abdominal trauma," the report says that a portion of Earvin's colon had been removed surgically and an ileostomy bag installed for waste removal.
In Earvin's system were morphine and Hydrocodone for pain and drugs used for anxiety and depression. He also had severe narrowing of the aorta, high blood pressure, cirrhosis and Hepatitis C.
The death certificate indicates that Earvin was born in an unknown Mississippi city. He was sentenced to six years in prison in 2015 for theft of merchandise under $300 in Cook County. His rap sheet also includes a seven-year stretch in 2004 for aggravated arson and previous convictions for retail theft, burglary, theft and attempted burglary dating to 1984.
The AP has been unable to locate any members of Earvin's family.
Hedden, Burnett, Haubrich and Banta were placed on administrative leave for "violations of standards of conduct pending investigation," documents show. Hess declined comment on the officers' current status and would not confirm their suspensions were connected to the Earvin incident. But in the department's response to the AP's request for their disciplinary records, the department indicated it was withholding relevant documents because the "FBI is the primary investigative agency in this matter and has determined that a release of these records would jeopardize the investigation."
Hedden declined comment when contacted. Messages left after calling numbers associated with the other correctional staff, Burnett, Haubrich and Banta, were not returned.
The corrections department initially said it didn't have any documents related to the incident. It denied AP's first request for records in July, and when the news organization appealed to the attorney general's public access counselor, the department responded that it had turned everything in its possession over to the FBI , and didn't even have copies of its own investigative reports. It later acknowledged it had found copies. The counselor ruled last week that the department had not fully complied with the Freedom of Information Act.
AP Researchers Jennifer Farrar and Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed.
Follow Political Writer John O'Connor at https://twitter.com/apoconnor .


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After making a batch of boreks, I found myself with a lot of leftover phyllo dough. About the only other phyllo dessert I know is baklava, but I didn't just want to make another honey and nut baklava. I was thinking of other flavors that might compliment the pistachios, almonds, and butter. Then it struck me that sweetened condensed milk has a similar viscosity to honey, and might go nicely with the nuts and butter. For flavor, I remembered I still had a brick of vanilla beans in the freezer that my friend got me from Madagascar, and I decided they would go nicely with the milk rather than a more traditional spice like cardamom.
To maximize the vanilla flavor, I added the scraped out beans to the nut mixture and steeped the pods in the sweetened condensed milk to make a vanilla milk syrup.
I won't even try to make any claim to authenticity here, but I personally enjoyed this more than the traditional baklavas I've made in the past. While they're rich and creamy on their own, these are even better with a cup of hot tea (or even hot water). I'm not sure what it is, but this baklava goes from having a sweet, slightly creamy flavor to being a creamy explosion of milk and vanilla when you eat it with tea.
This got me to thinking, are there other combination i could use? pumpkin seeds + allspice + condensed milk... or perhaps pecans + maple syrup... or maybe even walnuts + honey + pomegranate molasses...
📖 Recipe
- 1 package phyllo dough defrosted
- 1 ¼ cultured unsalted butter sticks melted (½ C + 2 Tbs)
- 1 Cup almonds shelled
- 2 vanilla beans
- 1 Cup pistachios shelled
- 2 tablespoons evaporated cane sugar granulated
- 1 Cup condensed milk sweetened
- Move the oven rack to the bottom middle position and pre-heat to 300 degrees F.
- Add the almonds to a food processor and pulse a few times until they resemble a rough gravel. Slice the vanilla beans down the center and scrape out the "beans", adding them to the food processor along with the pistachios and sugar (save the pods for later). Continue pulsing another 12-15 times until the nuts are chopped into small pieces.
- To assemble the baklava, brush a generous amount of melted butter onto the bottom and sides of a 9x9 baking pan. Unroll the phyllo dough and cut in half (you should have two 9"x14" stacks of phyllo). Starting at the edge of the pan closest to you, place a sheet of phyllo at the bottom allowing the extra phyllo to drape over the edge furthest from you. Brush the phyllo with melted butter. Fold the extra 5" of phyllo hanging off the side furthest from you onto itself. Brush the top of this surface with butter then lay another piece of phyllo down starting from the edge furthest from you (so the overhang is closest to you), butter then fold the overhang over. Repeat 4 more times.
- Sprinkle about half of the nut mixture evenly over the phyllo. Layer another 4 sheets of phyllo using technique above (buttering and alternating sides you overlap). Evenly spread the rest of the nut mixture on the phyllo and cover with 6 sheets of phyllo using the technique above. To finish, cut 2 sheets of phyllo to be exactly 9"x9", butter and layer. Press down gently on the baklava to allow the nuts to settle.
- Using a serrated edge steak knife, cut the baklava (all the way through) in a crisscross pattern. Drizzle the remaining butter on top brushing the top to ensure they're evenly coated. Put it in the oven for about 1 ½ hours or until the top is golden brown.
- To make the vanilla milk syrup, put the sweetened condensed milk in a small saucepan along with the vanilla pods and heat over low heat until the mixture is warm and bubbly. Use a spatula to try and scrape any remaining vanilla beans out of the pods and into the milk. Turn off the heat and let the pods steep in the milk until the baklava comes out of the oven.
- When the baklava is golden brown on top, remove it from the oven and immediately pour the vanilla milk syrup evenly over the cuts in the baklava (discarding the vanilla pods). Allow the baklava to cool completely in the pan. You can serve it as soon as its cooled, but it tastes best the next day.