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The Name of the Wind: A Novel
Written by Patrick Rothfuss
Narrated by Nick Podehl
Save for LaterSave The Name of the Wind: A Novel For Later
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars4.5/5 (1,357 ratings)
Brilliance Audio
A silence in three parts…
Rothfuss' masterpiece has taken the fantasy world by storm with its lyrical prose, the seeming boundlessness of the world, and the endearing faults and follies, compassion and cunning of the legendary Kvothe.
My name is Kvothe.
I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to Gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep.
You may have heard of me.
So begins a tale unequaled in fantasy literature-the story of a hero told in his own voice. It is a tale of sorrow, a tale of survival, a tale of one man's search for meaning in his universe, and how that search, and the indomitable will that drove it, gave birth to a legend.
"It is a rare and great pleasure to find a fantasist writing…with true music in the words…. Wherever Pat Rothfuss goes…he'll carry us with him as a good singer carries us through a song." -Ursula K. Le Guin, bestselling author and winner of the National Book Award
Leo and Diane Dillon
Alan Lee
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What people think about The Name of the Wind
1357 ratings / 428 reviews
jrg1316
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars(5/5)
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An amazing intro book to this trilogy. Kvothe is a very intriguing character. This book mainly explores the nature of magic with far more depth than the Harry Potter series could even dream of.
andrew1theqm
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What do you say about this book! It has to have the feel of one of the biggest books I have ever read with one of the biggest stories and I feel as it has only really started. Took me a while to get into it with all the characters, but then just devoured it despite it's size! This is a fantastic book and a fantastic story, and I don't know where it is going to go next but I just know I need to be along for the ride! And soon!
velmeran
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I really enjoyed this book. I read it fairly quickly considering its size. The length is not for the faint of heart! With good characterization and an interesting story line, this book is worth every page. I enjoyed that each of the books is a day's worth of story telling.
The main character is interesting without being necessarily likable. The story is an incredible, involved and twisting tale of his adventures. There are enough questions to keep me reading.
tjsjohanna_1
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Kvothe is this mysterious enigma at the beginning - but as he recounts his past to his small audience, the reader gets pulled into Kvothe's unique history and talents. It is a thrilling story and this novel just gets things started - there is no pretense that this is a stand alone story. Instead we get an extended setup for coming books, with no real story arc or conclusion.
wisealma-1
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The Name of the Wind Book Review
by Patrick Rothfuss
I give this great book 4.5 lutes out of 5.
No matter how I write this review, it will fail the book in some way. Patrick Rothfuss has written a wonderful adventure, epic in scope, and eloquent in its delivery. I don't just mean the prose, but the story's voice and setting too.
And world building. Yeah, that was fabulous as well.
The Name of the Wind is one of those novels that delivers everything to you subtly. It's one of those books that you have to read more than once just to make sure you caught everything, or to validate that you connected things correctly. There are hints, and twists, and turns salt and peppered throughout the book. Some are more obvious than others.
This story is really the beginning of a chronicle regarding a young, red-headed and green- eyed prodigy that we first meet as a tired innkeeper, hiding behind his bar from his adventurous past and the enemies he made. In his glory days, he was the stuff of legend. He went by many names: Kvothe the Kingkiller, Kvothe The Bloodless, and Kvothe the Arcane, among many others. Some of the titles were accurate, and others were a mere shadow of the truth.
It's the notion of Kvothe's legend that brings dark forces to Kote's neck of the woods. Kote is the name Kvothe goes by at this time in the story, his time as the innkeeper, as he would rather remain inconspicuous. Unsurprisingly, however, the evil from his past finds him anyway.
Strange, spider-like creatures, metallic and demonic, we come to know as Scraels began to turn up in the land. Kote set out on a mini-adventure at the beginning of the book, and slayed a score of them. In this process he saved a traveler known as Chronicler, who had been known to travel the four corners of civilization to log the legends and stories of his day. This is when the book really takes off, and takes its true form. Chronicler, an accomplished scrivener, convinced Kote to share the legend of Kvothe, and to awaken those powerful memories from his past. He wanted the true story. Kote finally agreed. He sat down with Bast, his closest servant and friend, and Chronicler to tell the tale.
Kvothe started near the beginning, and Chronicler jotted down his words. As a youth, Kvothe belonged to a talented traveling group called the Edema Rue. They were artists — storytellers, singers, and entertainers. They shared their talents and spun their tales as they laughed and sang, and captivated the locals with whom they came into contact. Their songs were powerful stories that caused grown men to weep, and young women to swoon. As the story progresses, an old sage type character joined the band of travelers, and he took note of Kvothe, and became his mentor. At one point, he expressed to Kvothe's parents, also part of the group, that he was naturally gifted, and had great potential. Eventually this man, Abenthy (or Ben, as Kvothe called him,) offered to sponsor him as an Arcanist. This would enable Kvothe to realize his future dreams, and study at the university learning the principles of magic and other forces.
Looking back, this was to be the lull before the storm, of course. Things were light hearted, and whimsical. Things were going well. Kvothe's father was hard at work on a highly anticipated song. Everyone wanted to hear it, but he wouldn't share any of it until it was ready. Kvothe's father was a master of the craft, and he had a reputation to upohld. His songs told powerful stories full of meaning and history, and musical artistry.
Finally, the pressure builds to a tipping point, and Kvothe's father shared what he had of the song. It was beautiful. Kvothe's father sang of the mystical people, the Chandrien, noted by their blue fire, among other things. People swooned and begged for more. All was wonderful.
But the Chandrien were real, and powerful, and controlling. One day Kvothe returned to the Edema Rue camp after having been away a bit, only to find them all dead—murdered. His parents, his friends, his travel mates - all killed. He saw blue fire.
It was the Chandrien.
When they had heard of the singing, the story of the Chandrien, the mouthpiece, and all that heard it had to be dealth with. Apparently they played a strong part in their legend.
I won't summarize the rest of the story for you. The is just the beginning, and the rest is great. If you want to learn more, you'll have to go out and read it. But, suffice it to say that this is a powerful moment in Kvothe's life, and a motivator. Not his sole motivator, but a driving force. He takes his last possession, his father's lute, and tries to survive on his own. He begs and steals, and does what he has to. Eventually he makes his way to the university and has a very different set of experiences that all lead up to a very sneaky, and sinister twist at the end of the book. I didn't see it coming at all, and I enjoyed it immensely. Did I mention it was sinister? It was my favorite set of scenes in the book.
If you like high fantasy, and you enjoy beautiful descriptions and a LONG story, this is one worth trying. It's super-popular, and so you'll have no problem finding a slew of reviews to help you decide whether or not to read The Name of the Wind.
If you read it, and enjoy it, there are a ton of forums and threads on the internet that dive into the lore and speculate on ever detail's meaning.
dmkc-1
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Great sword & sorcery novel that plays with the genre and possesses a sly grasp of real magic.
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Third Journalist Arrested While Trying to Cover Occupy Nashville: Free Press Calls for End to Arrests
December 3, 2011; Source: The Tennessean | In a continuing trend of arresting journalists covering Occupy actions around the country, on Saturday police arrested another journalist, this one covering Occupy Nashville. This is the third journalist to be arrested and subsequently released with no charges filed by the city. The journalist was arrested for disorderly conduct after he (along with some protesters) refused police orders to leave the middle of the road and protest on the sidewalk, according to the Tennessean.
Meanwhile a group called Free Press gathered 40,000 names on a petition that has been handed to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, who is the president of the United States Conference of Mayors. The petition calls for mayors to protect journalists covering the Occupy movement, expressing concern that the First Amendment is being violated.
Another account of interference with journalists, this time during a protest in New York, comes from Care2Make a difference:
When Josh Harkinson, a New York-based staff writer for Mother Jones, showed up around 9:30 and identified himself to police as a journalist, he was told to leave the area, he said.
Later, he was able to sneak past police and gain access to the protesters along with another journalist, Andrew Katz, who reports for The Brooklyn Ink, a local website produced by Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism.
Harkinson said he again identified himself as a journalist and started interviewing protesters from a spot in front of the barricade. That's when an officer grabbed him and physically escorted him away from the scene, he said.
"It wasn't violent, but he pushed me out," Harkinson said.
"The protesters were limited to a "free-speech zone" marked by police barricades near the Obama event; journalists were not allowed anywhere near it without police stepping in. MSNBC's Meg Robertson said that, on identifying herself as a member of the press, the NYPD 'would not let [her] close to the penned in area.'—Ruth McCambridge
Does Nonprofit Journalism Have a "Firewall" between News and Funding?
ProPublica Outlines Lessons from 3-Year Collaborative Journalism Project
By Meredith Betz
A letter from NPQ's founder
Pause for a Commercial Break on Nonprofit News
By Cassandra Heliczer
Another For-Profit News Source Goes Nonprofit

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Home / Articles / Sights / A Peek at the Past: Everett
By Scott Roberto / June 14, 12:00 AM
A Peek at the Past: Everett
Parlin Memorial Library courtesy Methuen Historic Collection
With the Encore Boston Harbor resort, the area's first casino, set to make its debut June 23, now is an ideal time to look back at the history of Everett, the suburban city just north of the Hub that plays host to this glittering new entertainment destination.
The territory that now forms Everett was initially part of Charlestown, which, when settled in 1629, included all or part of present-day Woburn, Melrose, Malden, Stoneham, Winchester, Somerville, Cambridge, Burlington and Arlington along with Everett. When Malden became a separate entity in 1649, both present-day Melrose and Everett fell within its confines. During the American Revolution, critical bulwarks were constructed and manned here, helping confine British troops within Boston until driven out in 1776.
It wasn't until 1870 that the southern district of Malden became the town of Everett, which was named after Edward Everett (1794–1865), a revered statesman who had served as Harvard President, congressman, governor and minister to Britain. In an unfortunate claim to fame, the skilled orator gave a lengthy key address at the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg during the Civil War, the words of which have been largely forgotten due to the fame of the speech that followed—Abraham Lincoln's immortal "Gettysburg Address." In that era, Everett was largely an agricultural community, a status that would soon change, as a surge in population growth led to the municipality's incorporation as a city in 1892.
Industrial growth in the early 20th century eventually eclipsed Everett's rural character, with many businesses, from a chemical company to a power plant, either establishing themselves or expanding during this period, particularly along the Mystic River waterfront to the south. Other notable distinctions include Everett's status as the last city in America to have a bicameral legislature (a seven-person Board of Aldermen and an 18-member Common Council), which it abandoned in favor of a singular City Council in 2011. Famed Everett natives include actress Ellen Pompeo of "Grey's Anatomy" and current University of Notre Dame head football coach Brian Kelly.
Today, in addition to Encore Boston Harbor, Everett is home to a growing brewery scene led by the popular Night Shift Brewing, Down the Road Beer Co., Bone Up Brewing and the soon-to-open BearMoose Brewing; the craft distillery Short Path; and the venerable Teddie Peanut Butter, a New England favorite that was founded in 1924.
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> >> create a file in /etc instead, it won't be used by the OS.  Never.
> >> on 9x systems.
> >Can we have a FAQ entry for that, btw.?
> it is missing that's a bug which needs to be fixed.
then the FAQ entry helps to avoid any further mail on this issue.


As the Mumbai terror attack seems to have finally ended and all terrorists seem to have been shot dead except one who is caught alive and in police custody, every eye would be on Indian Government on how to investigate the situation. People like us who were not affected will forget about this incident in few days just after its not shown on television, but people who have lost their loved once will never be able too. And that's just life. We don't understand others pain until we are in the situation of losing someone no matter how hard we try.
This post is also about a article I came across of Chetan Bhagat about suicide and his story. You can read it at http://witchofoz.rediffiland.com/blogs/2006/01/04/My-Stupid-Suicide-Plan-Chetan.html.


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What a stunning style the Noma Bedside Table offers you. A classic 1920s look with wenge and pure cream in perfect harmony. The upper box section is crafted from a shagreen top paired with our stunning wenge oak top section and frame. They give you this wonderful style that is full of rich elegance and so impressive. The satin black brushed steel slide pin drawer handle and frame are the loveliest balance. The perfect bedside table, offering both internal storage and the elegant top section. Meet your needs and desire with one attractive piece that will enhance any room with grace.


A federal judge on Tuesday ruled that U.S. immigration agents could no longer separate immigrant parents and children caught crossing the border from Mexico illegally, and must work to reunite those families that had been split up in custody.
United States District Court Judge Dana Sabraw granted the American Civil Liberties Union a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit filed over the family separations.
More than 2,300 migrant children were separated from their parents after the Trump administration began a "zero tolerance" policy in early May, seeking to prosecute all adults who crossed the border illegally, including those traveling with children.
The ACLU had sued on behalf of a mother and her then 6-year-old daughter, who were separated after arriving last November in the United States to seek asylum and escape religious persecution in Democratic Republic of Congo.
While they were reunited in March, the ACLU is pursuing class-action claims on behalf of other immigrants.
Trump issued an executive order to end the family separations on June 20, but the government has yet to reunite about 2,000 children with their parents.
Before the preliminary injunction ruling, the U.S. government urged Sabraw not to require that it stop separating and quickly reunite migrant families after they illegally cross the U.S.-Mexico border, saying President Donald Trump's executive order last week "largely" addressed those goals.


What I Want You to Know is a series of reader submissions. It is an attempt to allow people to tell their personal stories, in the hopes of bringing greater compassion to the unique issues each of us face. If you would like to submit a story to this series, click here. Today's guest posts is by Rose.
There are days (a lot of them), when I desperately want to start a family. When I daydream about having a baby, a toddler, a child or teen; about the books I would read with them, the songs I'd sing and games we'd play, the science fair projects and family vacations and music lessons and birthday parties. I'm not at a time in my life when I can have children—I'm in grad school, will be for another three or four years, and then a post-doc for two or so years after that before I can even really hope for a job. While I can support myself on my stipend, it's not really enough for a family. Other grad students do have families, but I just can't imagine managing it, especially as I'm away doing field research for two months every summer. Additionally, while my partner and I have been together for over two years, we're not at the point in the relationship where we could have children. Logically I know that we have plenty of time—I'm only 24, I started grad school young, there will be time—no matter how impatient I may feel sometimes.
But there are other difficulties. Because the partner I mentioned is another woman. And while my local community may be completely accepting of that fact, that cannot remove the added difficulties of starting a family. We will never be able to simply decide that we want a child and get pregnant. All of our options need more—a known sperm donor or purchase from a sperm bank, medical aid for insemination, or the time and expense of adopting. While I am interested in fostering and/or adopting from the foster care system, I would like to raise a non-special needs child from infancy at least once. And that is not something that will be straightforward for us.
There are few people who seem to understand. Straight friends comment that having children is always expensive (yes, but try adding on $20,000 in adoption fees! Or the medical costs for the artificial insemination alone, not to mention the cost of sperm from a bank and the other costs of pregnancy. And insurance that covers infertility treatment may not cover services for healthy lesbian or single women. It's not like the costs of food and clothes and diapers and childcare and college are any less after all of that.) None of my lesbian friends seem particularly interested in children in the near future, or talk about having families. Older couples with children focus on the joy of having a family; I can find hardly anyone talking about how unfair it can feel that it's so much harder for us to even start.
It's not the same experience as infertility. As far as we know, we're both reproductively healthy, so if we decide to try artificial insemination, the chances are high that one of us will be able to conceive and carry a child. We haven't been through the heartbreak of months or years spent trying to conceive or of losing a pregnancy. There are many ways in which my experience has been easier.
But there are also similarities. I look at my peers who are pregnant, and I'm jealous that they can just do that so easily. While my friends talk about buying houses, I think about saving for both a down payment and adoption fees. When they talk about timing a pregnancy to coincide with writing a thesis, I wonder if it's even possible to begin the adoption process when we'd be likely to be moving to another state within a year. When I catch myself thinking that our child would inherit such-and-such, I must remind myself that they will have genetic similarities to one of us at most. While I do firmly believe that adoption is a wonderful way to have a family and biological relationships don't determine love, I can't help a pang at the thought that at least one pair of grandparents won't be able to find a family resemblance. There are days when I am so unspeakably and irrationally jealous of my cousin, who was careless and ended up with a child, while I must wait, and save, and plan, and be responsible, and wait some more. It is so much harder for us than for most straight couples, and I do envy them.
And that doesn't even include the difficulties after a child is born or adopted. Last year the people of our state voted to outlaw not only marriage, but any legal recognition of our relationship, and second parent adoption was recently dropped as well. This means that we could not have a legally protected family. If I was the biological or adoptive mother, my partner would have no rights or power to protect our children. If I lost my job, there is a high chance that her insurance could not cover the kids. If we ended the relationship, I would have the ability to remove her from our children's lives entirely (not that I would). In a medical emergency, she would not be able to make medical decisions or even see her child in the hospital. While some of these can be managed with the appropriate legal steps, not all of them can. This makes the thought of having children while living here incredibly scary; the legal protections that most families don't even think about are entirely out of our reach until the law changes. Such a situation does the opposite of protecting families.
There is also the social bias. Our children will learn so young about prejudice and intolerance, about the people who wish our family didn't exist or think that we cannot be good parents, the children who will have been taught that our family is inferior and may tease them for that. All I can do to protect them is to live my life openly and lovingly, to be honest and caring and find them safe spaces, and show through our living that our path is as loving and joyful and valid as any other. That hardly seems like enough.
There is a gift in these challenges, though. We cannot take the straight and easy path, the one that our society overwhelming presents as the way of making a family. My straight friends don't even think about how they'll have children; one friend who likes children but not babies still seems set on bearing her own instead of considering adopting an older child who needs a home. If the easier, more straightforward, more expected path is available, there are fewer reasons to consider others. But we've started from a position where we must consider the other options, and we have so many choices for how to make a family; bearing a child and adopting an infant or older child(ren) later, adopting siblings out of foster care, each of us bearing a child at some point. . . there are so many possibilities, and we are considering many of them. The goal of more equal parenting seems so much easier, too, when separated from traditional gender roles. I had no idea how much I had internalized the role of the mother as the primary caregiver until I thought about having a family with a female partner and felt such relief that it wouldn't all rest on me. It's not that straight couples cannot do these things; but the fact that we are a same-gender couple makes it easier to break away from the limited range of traditional molds and decide for ourselves how we want to have our family. The challenges bring the gift of opening our eyes to all the possibilities.
What do I want you to know? Regardless of sexual orientation, I want a family just like many people do. I really think that we have the potential to be good parents and raise happy and successful children. There are enough inescapable obstacles for us in the road to parenthood; the additional legal and social difficulties just make it that much harder for us to have a family. I want people to know that every time another law is changed in order to make it harder for us to have a recognized partnership or equal rights, it feels like an attack not just on me but on my future family. I want people to, when they're teaching their children, to teach them their beliefs and to be sure to include respect for other families, so that my children won't suffer prejudice. I want people to know that my family will be a valid and loving family, and that we will be good parents, regardless of gender. I want the people who know families with LGBT parents to remember that it is harder; that while we may achieve the happy result, there is a greater difficulty in getting there. An understanding of the concerns and obstacles that we face is helpful—don't talk about my future family like it will be as easy as yours, because it likely won't be, don't minimize the additional difficulties. Allow me to be jealous occasionally, while still sincerely joyful for those who are expecting children. And remember, above all, that we will be a family. Because while at times it seems so difficult, I have faith that we will one day have a joyful, loving family.


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The Smiley Smile Message Board | Smiley Smile Stuff | General On Topic Discussions | California Calling
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Author Topic: California Calling (Read 5968 times)
feelintheflows
California Calling
Anyone know why this wasn't released as a single...?
SydBarrett
Re: California Calling
Quote from: feelintheflows on February 24, 2019, 04:18:16 PM
It's a pretty bad retread of Surfin USA
"Too dumb for New York City, too ugly for L.A."
Quote from: SydBarrett on February 24, 2019, 06:43:30 PM
That's not a reason in Beach Boys land not to release it. I also wondered why it wasn't a single as it definitely is catchy and sounds like a potential hit.
a diseased bunch of mo'fos if there ever was one… their beauty is so awesome that listening to them at their best is like being in some vast dream cathedral decorated with a thousand gleaming American pop culture icons.
- Lester Bangs on The Beach Boys
PRO SHOT BEACH BOYS CONCERTS - LIST
To sum it up, they blew it, they blew it consistently, they continue to blow it, it is tragic and this pathological problem caused The Beach Boys' greatest music to be so underrated by the general public.
- Jack Rieley
It was apparently released as a single (commercial and promo?) in Australia:
THE BEACH BOYS OPINION PAGE IS ON FACEBOOK!!! http://www.facebook.com/beachboysopinion - Check out the original "BEACH BOYS OPINION PAGE" Blog - http://beachboysopinion.blogspot.com/
Because it sucks? Seriously, it's one of my least favorite Beach Boys songs.
A son of anarchy surrounded by the hierarchy.
The LEGENDARY OSD
luHv Estrangement Syndrome. It's a great thing!
Quote from: Jay on February 25, 2019, 10:19:46 AM
Yeah, pretty much in the bottom tier of their catalog. Definitely not "hit" material.
myKe luHv, the most hated, embarrassing clown the world of music has ever witnessed.
urbanite
I'm not a fan of how Mike Love sang on it, somewhat similar to what he did on It's A Beautiful Day.
ForHerCryingSoul
I think I am in the minority then, I like how they sang on it. It's a nice harken to their younger days. Mike sounded so off in the 70's and sounds better here. I just hate the Culture Club-esque production. Blegh.
It was apparently a single in Japan, instead of "It's Gettin' Late" (coupled with It's OK):
Also, count me in for those who care for this song - although it's not the best thing on the BB85 album, I think it is a hit material, in the same vein as "It's OK", that should have been a single.
« Last Edit: February 25, 2019, 07:50:08 PM by Wata » Logged
positivemusic
Quote from: The LEGENDARY OSD on February 25, 2019, 10:47:35 AM
I agree. As someone who actually likes "It's A Beautiful Day," I honestly think this song is awful. The lyrics try too hard to sound hip and retro at the same time and fail miserably.
I might even put this below Summer In Paradise, which, while not a great album by any means, at least tried new things (i.e. rap, production techniques, etc...)
Peadar 'Big Dinner' O'Driscoll
Possibly the worst BB's song....if summer of love didn't exist.
MBW Youtube Demos
CenturyDeprived
Quote from: positivemusic on February 26, 2019, 05:51:37 AM
I agree, especially with the verse lyrics. Although the chorus is acceptable IMO.
When Al sings the lyric "totally rad", I'm still trying to process whether there was any sort of ironic intent, or if he said it with complete sincerity, thinking that people would take him seriously as a 1980s rocker, especially as he grew his mullet out around the same time to be fully current with the times.
Because honestly it strikes me as probably the most laughable and lame attempt to be hip in the entire history of the band... I suppose the entirety of "summer of love" is far worse, but this lyric is just sooo funny (not on purpose) coming from a guy born in 1942.
« Last Edit: February 26, 2019, 08:36:01 AM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
Juice Brohnston
Is it possible that it was in the queue to be the next single? I base this on the end of the Video for It's Getting Late, where Brian picks up the shell and hears the song. Maybe the momentum had died too early for CC.
guitarfool2002
"Barba non facit aliam historici"
Maybe something geared toward a discussion of the BB '85 album, but honestly the album itself, the majority of it, does not sound at all out of place with what was on top-40 radio at that time. I know, I was listening to top-40 radio constantly at that time. Hot Hits 98 in Philly, with DJ's like Terry "Motormouth" Young and Barsky...and it may very well have been the last gasp of what we know as Top 40 radio and related culture. Like DJ's coming to local high schools and spinning new records for the kids, etc...
Anyway, the album itself is not out of place, in terms of production and sonics, with whatever else was hitting top 40 and MTV at the time. Getcha Back *works*, it's a good single, but above all it sounded exactly like other big hits of the day (The Spector retro throwback touches, the overall 80's update of the girl group, 4 Seasons, Spector sonic elements...castanets wailing, etc.) . It could sit next to "Say Goodbye To Hollywood" by Billy Joel, "Uptown Girl" again by Billy, "Take Me Home Tonight" by Eddie Money feat. Ronnie Spector, "They Don't Know" by Tracey Ullman written by the brilliant Kirsty MacColl, and a host of other tunes that updated the classic AM 60's pop vibes.
And, just to touch on an earlier comment, this "California Calling" track does not sound like Culture Club. Culture Club had better *songs*, that were catchy as hell, and had a terrific white soul singer in Boy George. Those reggae grooves, those gospel grooves, with George singing lead - They were good records of good songs. This California mess...not even close. It doesn't sound like Culture Club to me at all, it falls way short of CC's hit records from the few years before this one, and is a middle aged band singing material that should have been left in the dirty sand under the pier alongside the empty bottles of Genny Cream Ale and Doritos bags.
What California Calling sounds like to me is closer to one of Mike's numerous cassette-only releases from either Radio Shack/Hitbound, the gas stations, or whatever other outlets he was targeting.
It's trying to update something that doesn't need to be updated. Yet, for the 30 or so years...Hell, actually up to the present...Mike can't get beyond trying to do covers and remakes and update things that should have been left as what made them classic in the first place. Yes, this is a Wilson/Jardine composition, I know, but it sounds like it falls into that same pit of misplaced nostalgia and guys in their late 40's with comb-overs, beer guts, and bad golf shirts trying to hit on girls at a college town's local bar. It's done.
Comparing this to Summer In Paradise, specifically "Summer Of Love"? Nothing goes lower than that. Nothing. The Beach Boys featuring Mike trying to rap, and having a Baywatch video...Not much if anything can or will go lower than that sh*t.
But this track, it's kind of sad because the album itself actually wasn't that bad, and as heard in Getcha Back, they were still capable of current music and respectable songwriting efforts that sounded like it fit on Top 40 radio while not resorting to cliches and surfer bullshit that too often plagued their solo and group releases from 1979 up to 2018. They didn't have to sound like Mike's cassette-only debacles, yet here they unfortunately did...in lyrics, sound, and the whole ball o' wax.
"All of us have the privilege of making music that helps and heals - to make music that makes people happier, stronger, and kinder. Don't forget: Music is God's voice." - Brian Wilson
It's also super bizarre that this song, of all songs, has drums by Ringo Starr. Of all songs for him to do a guest appearance on, it's baffling that this track happened to be what was picked... I'm guessing that was just simply a matter of timing and what was available. Does anyone know the story of how that came to be?
Yeah, Ringo on this of all tracks he *could* have guested on...I don't get it. As far as how he got on the track, they probably just called him.
What's even more under-heralded if not ignored by most people these days is that Stevie Wonder...Stevie F***ing Wonder...contributed "I Do Love You" to the album! Stevie in 1984-85 was as hot of a commercial artist as he had been, and here he shows up basically creating a full track of his original song for Carl Wilson to sing on. And Carl *nailed* it, which is no surprise given his love for Stevie's music dating back to the 60's. The track itself is a little too sophisticated and jazzy to have gotten Top-40 charting success, but it could have fit on any Adult Contemporary/Urban Contemporary playlist that year.
And it sounds like any Stevie Wonder track that was burning up the charts and airwaves in the early to mid 80's, so again it's another case of the Beach Boys putting a solid effort on a track for this album, and having it all but ignored moving forward to the present. It's a solid track, and in terms of what Stevie Wonder brought to the table, it's all there.
Just think...Imagine Mike getting his wish to have his cover of "At The Hop" placed on the album. That's the mentality which brought California Calling to the table, I believe. Yet the tracks surrounding it are pretty distinctively *not* 100% in that phony surfer nostalgia vein.
Joel Goldenberg
I liked California Calling one day when I was listening, not paying close attention, and thinking it was something vintage. For a few seconds.
I suppose that with better production(actual insteuments, and with a mix that doesn't sound so sterile) and better lyrics it could be better. That "totally rad" line just hurts to my soul though. This is the same group that recorded "All I Wanna Do", "Long Promised Road", and "Surf's Up"?
Mike should update the song for his 2019 set, and to make it extra contemporary and fitting for the song itself, just change the title/yric to California LOL-ing
« Last Edit: February 26, 2019, 02:02:19 PM by CenturyDeprived » Logged
Line in bold: Imagine that same scenario when you'd see a "new" Beach Boys album appear, called "Summer In Paradise", and listening for the first time to THAT.
That reaction you posted is exactly what my own reaction was, to SIP and numerous other missteps and flops. I call it Jekyll And Hyde. You'd be in a record store, in the Beach Boys section, and see Summer In Paradise in the same bins as the two-fers and various reissues, and think "Is this the same group?"
Quote from: Rocker on February 25, 2019, 04:16:44 AM
In Beach Boys land post 1975, sounding like a potential hit is all the reason you need NOT to release it as a single.
Also, recording amazing groundbreaking music is all the reason you need to leave it in the vault for the next 40 years.
I also recall that while they were mixing "California Dreamin'" in late 1982 at Rumbo, they also recorded an early version of "California Calling." It would be at the very least interesting to hear that early version.
I don't believe any of the 84/85 Levine recordings used old BB tracks as a basis, so whatever exists of that '82 version of "California Calling" hasn't been heard. I'm not sure how far along that '82 version got (e.g. are there vocals?).
The song's lyrics are pretty bad. BB '85 isn't exactly Exhibit A for the band's lyrical prowess. But some of the lyrics are extra cheesy. The best stuff on the '85 album is the Carl stuff, and probably then a few of the tracks from outside writers.
"California Calling" is cut from the same cloth as other 80s "retro" tracks the band did, and I don't think a ton of those were going to get them high on the charts (or good critical notices). I think "Getcha Back" was about as far as they could go as far as doing something in that 80s mode of 50s/60s "retro" that could also have some amount of success on the charts.
A few years later and *maybe* it would have been easier to market the Carl tracks to "Adult Contemporary" radio. But it's all big "ifs" and I don't think they were ever destined to have "hit singles" again; "Kokomo" was a happy fluke.
Quote from: HeyJude on February 27, 2019, 07:48:25 AM
Is it safe to assume that Denny had nothing to do with the recording of this 82 version?
I wonder if he even heard a single note of any of the "gems" that the band was cooking up in the last few years of his life, regardless if he contributed to their recording or not. Does anyone know?
Quote from: CenturyDeprived on February 27, 2019, 01:24:06 PM
Considering "California Dreamin'" was cut with session musicians in 1982, and that Dennis was only sporadically appearing in the studio in the early 80s and was rarely if ever doing layered group backing vocals by that point, I'd guess he's not on it.
C-man posted this several years back in a thread focusing on whether Brian was on the track:
Interestingly, the original report on the May 1982 "California Dreamin'" vocal session at Rumbo (printed in the Summer '82 issue of "Add Some Music") was that it "featured the entire Beach Boy vocal ensemble - including Carl and Brian". Reason Carl would be specifically mentioned is that he had just then returned to the band. But since both Jeff and Adrian were in the band at the time (and both are credited with "backup" on the Radio Shack "Rock and Roll City" cassette released a year later - which included, of course, the original '82 version of this track) my guess is they are BOTH on it. They were certainly part of the "Beach Boy vocal ensemble" at the time.
I remember a super old thread, maybe even on an old board, trying to figure out who is doing the falsetto/high parts on "CD." All theories are on the table, including Brian, Bruce, Foskett, or Adrian Baker.
super sally
I was 15 when this came out and I played for a friend and I remember we were both laughing out loud at these terrible lyrics:
And I'll take ya' boogie boardin' with me
'Cause when we're surfin' it's so great to be free
And when you're on a California beach
You might even find 'em windsurfin' too
In the fifties it was "Hey Daddy O"
Then came the surfers and the Hodads ya' know
We had our woodies and our custom cars
And when we drove around we knew we were bad
My baby listens to my car radio
And when we're cruisin' lets the whole world know
And when our favorite surfin' song comes on
We always let 'em know it's "Totally Rad!"
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A high-level executive summary containing some of the most important news articles that have been published on Forensic and Cyber Security matters during the last month.
Cyber attacks reach a record high, Cert NZ report shows
Reported cybersecurity incidents have reached a record high, according to Cert NZ's latest quarterly report. From July 1 to September 30, the cybersecurity agency received more than 2,600 incident reports from individuals and businesses; the highest number to date and a 33 per cent increase on the second quarter. The reported, direct financial loss was at $6.4m (the average quarterly loss, based on 14 quarters, was $3.6m.)
Attacks circulated by email were among the most commonly reported incidents. In particular, a variation of malicious software, or malware, called Emotet, which is spread through email links or attachments, was responsible for a 34 per cent increase in malware reports on the previous quarter.
Cyber threats continue to increase in New Zealand, new report finds
A new report has found cyber threats are continuing to grow in New Zealand, as attacks become more sophisticated. The annual National Cyber Security Centre threat report shows:
404 incidents impacting nationally significant organisations
a 15% increase on last year's total
around a quarter showed links to suspected state-sponsored actors, while about the same amount were criminally and financially motivated
26% of incidents had insufficient information to assess anything about the actor responsible or their motivation.
UK Spooks Handled Record Number of Cyber-Incidents Last Year
The UK's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) has hailed its world-beating cybersecurity expertise after handling hundreds of incidents and disrupting millions of cyber-attack campaigns over the past year. The government agency, part of signals intelligence body GCHQ, said it offered wraparound support for a record 777 incidents over the period, including attacks on COVID-19 vaccine research, distribution and supply chains.
In summary, the report details:
an increase of over 7% on the previous year
20% of cases in total linked to the healthcare and vaccine sectors
the new Suspicious Email Reporting Service, which accrued 5.9 million reports over the year, leading to the removal of more than 53,000 scams and 96,500 malicious URLs
the NCSC's Active Cyber Defence program, which took down 2.3 million cyber-enabled "commodity campaigns," 442 phishing campaigns using NHS branding, and 80 malicious NHS apps.
FBI Email Server Hacked, Thousands Of Spam Emails Said To Be Sent Out
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) confirmed that one of its email servers had been hacked, resulting in spam emails being sent to the public that appeared to be from the agency and the Department of Homeland Security. The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency "encourage the public to be cautious of unknown senders" and to report suspicious activity to them. The hack was uncovered by a cybersecurity watchdog group, the Spamhaus Project, which tweeted that the phony email campaign began at midnight. Spamhaus Project told Bloomberg that it estimated the spam emails were sent to over 100,000 accounts, warning them that they were being attacked by cybersecurity researcher Vinny Troia and cybercriminal group The Dark Overlord.
Cyber Security Baseline Standards published, to build cyber resilience across all Public Service Bodies
The Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, Ossian Smyth T.D., has today published Cyber Security Baseline Standards and associated implementation guidelines for use by Public Service Bodies. The publication of Baseline Standards was one of the key measures identified in the National Cyber Security Strategy 2019-2024. The Strategy stated that, under Measure 8, the NCSC (Nationals Cyber Security Centre) would formulate Baseline Standards in conjunction with the OGCIO (Office of the Government Chief Information Officer). The main goal of the Cyber Security Baseline Standards is to improve the resilience and security of information and communications technology infrastructure and systems (ICT) in Public Service Bodies.
FCA to spend $670k on digital currency training and forensics
The United Kingdom's financial regulator is seeking better oversight over the digital currency industry. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has issued a tender offer for a company that can provide blockchain data forensic services and train its employees on digital currencies. FCA has become ever more involved in the digital currency industry. While it only used to publish warnings against sketchy and unregistered companies in the past, it has taken a more active approach in recent months. In 2020, it became the anti-money laundering regulator for the sector. Two months ago, FCA Chair Charles Randell asked for even more oversight over the industry, saying there was a proliferation of useless pump and dump tokens. Now, the watchdog is looking to spend half a million pounds to beef up its digital currency monitoring capabilities. In a tender offer, the FCA revealed that it was seeking "access to specialist services to support the analysis of cryptoasset blockchain data."
Summary of last month's Cyber Alerts and News Clips:
Incident Response Solutions post certain alerts and tips we consider to be in the public interest as it comes to hand. We publish these alerts and tips on our YouTube Channel and this webpage.
24 November 2021 – CISA Releases Capacity Enhancement Guides to Enhance Mobile Device Cybersecurity for Consumers and Organizations
12 November 2021 – CISA – Palo Alto Networks Release Security Updates for PAN-OS
9 November 2021 – AG Merrick Garland Announces Department Of Justice Charging REvil Cybercrime Suspects
Our Views: CIS Controls 16-18
This month brings us to the end of our CIS control deep dive by looking at the final three controls: 16, 17 and 18. CIS controls 16 and 18 are more advanced options for business who are medium to large and employ individuals responsible for managing and protecting IT infrastructure. However, CIS 17 is highly recommended for all businesses for basic security hygiene.
CIS Control 16: Application Software Security
Manage the security life cycle of in-house developed, hosted, or acquired software to prevent, detect, and remediate security weaknesses before they can impact the enterprise.
Why is it needed?
Access management applications enable users to easily manage a business's sensitive data and to grant access to system resources. Attackers with access to these applications can therefore also directly use these them to compromise data without needing an elaborate hacking sequence to bypass network security controls. Hence the need to strongly protect user credentials, as outlined in CIS control 6. However, even without access to user credentials, cyber criminals will target applications by looking for application vulnerabilities. Attackers will then exploit these vulnerabilities to take control of network assets.
Application vulnerabilities may exist due to insecure design, coding mistakes, poor authentication practices, infrastructure weaknesses or insufficient testing. Today's applications are more complex and dynamic. Agile "DevOps" cycles are now used that involve frequent code change and most applications are no longer built from scratch but assembled from many contributing parts. All these factors have increased the complexity and challenge of building secure applications. Additionally, the increased use of Software as a Service (SaaS) has decreased the visibility of some application development and security practices and consequently the level of risk they carry. Business should therefore follow the safeguards outlined in this control for all application development and any extension or customisation of SaaS products.
How is it implemented?
No part of this control is recommended as part of basic security hygiene or IG1 (small to medium-sized businesses with limited IT and cybersecurity expertise) however there are 14 safeguards to consider for more mature organisations. To start implementing this control, a secure application development process must be established. Ideally this will introduce security needs early in any software development lifecycle and include addressing secure design and coding standards, developer training, vulnerability management, secure testing processes and third-party code security. The vulnerability process would provide a mechanism for third parties to report vulnerabilities and include procedures for intake, assignment, remediation and testing of vulnerabilities. Additionally, a tracking system should be implemented that can report key metrics on the application vulnerability process, as well as performing root cause analysis on identified vulnerabilities.
Procedures for managing third party components is also required to satisfy this control. An inventory of third-party software components should be created, sometimes called a "bill of materials." This inventory should include any risks that each component could pose. Only up-to-date and trusted third-party software components must be allowed. Further safeguards for this control include:
Establishing and Maintaining a Severity Rating System and Process for Application Vulnerabilities
Use Standard Hardening Configuration Templates for Application Infrastructure
Separate Production and Non-Production Systems
Train Developers in Application Security Concepts and Secure Coding
Apply Secure Design Principles in Application Architectures
Leverage Vetted Modules or Services for Application Security Components
The safeguards outlined above satisfy IG2 requirements. Larger and more mature teams should consider the additional safeguards of:
Implementing Code-Level Security Checks
Conducting Application Penetration Testing
Conducting Threat Modelling
Application software security is a large and detailed area and therefore the safeguards in CIS control 16 outline the most critical areas only. The NIST published the Secure Software Development Framework (SSDF) in 2020 to help organisations build their application security requirements and understand whether a products development follows best practice. Using this resource to extend your organisations knowledge is highly recommended. Further recommended industry resources are also freely available as references including: SAFECODE Application Security Addendum, The Software Alliance Framework and OWASP guidelines.
CIS Control 17: Incident Response Management
Establish a program to develop and maintain an incident response capability (e.g., policies, plans, procedures, defined roles, training, and communications) to prepare, detect, and quickly respond to an attack.
The intent of incident response management is to identify threats to the organisation, respond to them before they can spread, and remediate them before they cause harm. A well-rounded cybersecurity programme follows a recognised framework and includes capability in each area of identification, protection, detection, response, and recovery. Often response and recovery are overlooked in less mature organisations. As protections cannot be relied upon 100%, the ability to respond to a cyber incident and recover from this effectively is therefore vital.
An attacker can dwell within systems for days, weeks, and months, before being detected. This gives them ample time to find and review confidential data and traverse laterally within an organisations network, potentially planting further vulnerabilities and "backdoors" for later compromise. Due to the recent rise in ransomware this behaviour has become more common. A common response to cyber incidents in immature organisations is to just "re-image" assets to the original state and move on. However, without using a thorough incident response process to fully understand the scope of any incident, how it happened, and how it can be prevented in future, the risk of the same or a similar threat will remain.
Smart business decisions are essential to reduce any further potential impact of the cyber incident particularly when communicating with stakeholders, meeting legal and regulatory obligations, and prioritising remediation activities. If an organisation does not have a cyber incident response plan in place they will struggle with these decisions when a cyber incident occurs. Even with great people, under the pressure and time constraints of a cyber incident it is extremely difficult to know the correct investigative procedure to follow and what reporting, data collection, legal protocols and communication strategies should be undertaken to minimise harm.
This control includes safeguards that constitute minimum basic security hygiene for all businesses. Even small organisations with limited resources to conduct incident response activities should have an incident response plan. The plan at a minimum should identify the source of protections and detections (e.g.: where an alert or notification of a potential cyber incident may come from), a list of who to call upon for assistance, and communication plans and mechanisms to inform required parties such as leadership, employees, regulators, partners, and customers.
At a basic level:
Designate Personnel to Manage Incident Handling
Establish and Maintain Contact Information for Reporting Security Incidents
Establish and Maintain an Enterprise Process for Reporting Incidents
After these basic safeguards are implemented, it is recommended a full incident response process be established. Key roles and responsibilities for incident response activities across the business should be defined and reviewed periodically. Primary and secondary communication mechanisms to be used during an incident must also be defined. It is important to remember that some standard communication channels such as email may be either unavailable or no longer secure for use during a cyber incident.
Once these procedures are in place then they must be tested. The incident response team or a third-party should conduct regular scenario walk through's (sometimes referred to as tabletop simulations or gold-teaming exercises) to fine-tune the business response. Walk throughs allow the business to fully understand their roles and responsibilities in a cyber incident and these scenarios can effectively identify gaps or dependencies in the current procedures. Finally conducting post incident reviews allows lessons learned to be incorporated into plans and help prevent incident recurrence.
Finally, more mature organisations can also consider including threat intelligence and threat hunting into their incident response process. This enables proactive monitoring for tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTPs) of likely threat actors and can help focus and define the response procedures most suitable for the organisation.
CIS Control 18: Penetration Testing
Test the effectiveness and resiliency of enterprise assets through identifying and exploiting weaknesses in controls (people, processes, and technology), and simulating the objectives and actions of an attacker.
Penetration testing goes a step further than basic security hygiene and therefore it is not included at IG1 level. However, this control includes safeguards at both IG2 and IG3 for consideration.
An organisations cyber defence posture can be strong, but due to the everchanging and complex nature of technology and the evolving nature of cyber-attacks, it is rarely perfect. Penetration testing allows a business to test their defensive controls and identify gaps in these that will impact overall resiliency. Penetration testing can be focused on external network attacks, internal network threats, applications, systems, or devices and may include social engineering techniques to trick users or physical security breaches. It differs from vulnerability testing (described in CIS control 7) as it is an active attempt to exploit weaknesses to see how far an attacker may get, and what data, systems, and business processes may be impacted by success.
Penetration tests can be used as a compelling demonstration of organisations weaknesses, to validate whether the business has the correct defences in place, or as a tool to verify the correct operation of currently deployed defences. They often involve significant human involvement and analysis in conjunction with custom scripts and tools. As penetration testing can be is complex, it may also be expensive and introduce risk, such as the unexpected shutdown of a system or the possibility of data deletion or corruption. Because of this it should only be undertaken by experienced specialists from reputable vendors.
The first step to satisfying this control is to establish and maintain a penetration testing program. This includes determining the scope of any penetration testing engagement (For example, will the testing include network, web application, API's, hosted services, physical controls) and key factors such as acceptable hours for testing, excluded attack types, and confidentiality of findings. Defining scope is critical to establish clear rules of engagement and minimise any possible unexpected collateral damage that can occur from invasive testing.
Periodic external penetration tests (based on the requirements outlined in the program established above) should be undertaken at least annually. An external test should include reconnaissance to detect exploitable data. The number of internal people that know about the test should be minimised and ideally a business would focus on testing assets that hold the highest value information or production processing functionality. Consider conducting a penetration test through third-party legal counsel to ensure the report is protected from disclosure. After a test is conducted any test findings must be remediated.
Advanced safeguards in this control include validating security measures after each penetration test and performing periodic internal penetration test. Further detail and support for Penetration testing can also be found in the following resources:
OWASP Penetration Testing Methodologies
This brings us to the end of our deep dive on the CIS control set. Using this control set gives your organisation a structured and prioritised plan for improving your cyber security posture. We highly recommend starting to define your cyber security program by measuring your organisation against the IG1 group of CIS controls which make up the basic security hygiene measures for any business.
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The NZ Incident Response Bulletin is a monthly high-level executive summary containing some of the most important news articles that have been published on Forensic and Cyber Security matters during the last month. Also included are articles written by Incident Response Solutions, covering topical matters. Each article contains a brief summary and if possible, includes a linked reference on the web for detailed information. The purpose of this resource is to assist Executives in keeping up to date from a high-level perspective with a sample of the latest Forensic and Cyber Security news.
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The chaos erupted as thousands of supporters tried to follow President Muhammadu Buhari's convoy out of a stadium in the southeastern city of Port Harcourt in Rivers State, a journalist covering the rally told CNN.
"I saw four bodies on the ground, and there was so much confusion as people were rushing and pushing each other to leave the stadium," Chikwe Azoma said.
Hospital officials put the death toll considerably higher — at 15 victims — a spokesman for the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital told CNN on Wednesday.
"We received 14 bodies from the stadium, and one of those injured later died. Twelve people are receiving treatment at the emergency ward," Kem Daniel-Elebiga said.
Rivers State police insisted four people were killed and four taken to the hospital, spokesman Nnamdi Omoni told CNN.
Casualties and violence have marred a heated campaign season leading up to the presidential polls on Saturday and general elections later this month.
Three people were stabbed and several injured after rival supporters clashed at a rally of Buhari's All Progressives Congress party in January in Lagos. At least two people were killed at rally for that party last week in the northeastern state of Taraba.
Buhari, who is on a nationwide campaign to drum up support for his re-election, offered his condolences after last week's incident and called on his supporters to comply with crowd managers at rallies.
"I always feel very sad and distressed when ordinary Nigerians, who love me and our party because of what we stand for and have done, make personal sacrifices by taking the pains to show their support (and) end their lives tragically," the President said.
Buhari, 76, is vying for Nigeria's top office against 71 challengers. His main contender is 72-year-old Atiku Abubakar, Nigeria's former vice president. Both candidates signed a second peace accord on Wednesday in the capital of Abuja, pledging their commitment to an election free of violence.


text:
Weaving a Peace?
PEACEWEAVING – Shamanistic insights into mediating the transformation of power, by Ben Hoffman, January 2013 – a review for Peacehawks, by Neil Patton
Peaceweaving is not your typical book on mediation. And Ben Hoffman is not your typical mediator. Hoffman has mediated a wide range of conflicts. From commercial agreements to prison hostage situations to disputes between violent African Warlords, his career has taken him from posh boardrooms to the naked risks of undisclosed jungle encampments.
Hoffman provides a thorough overview of the classic and de rigeur tools and tactics of the mediation trade, but his unique addition to the discipline is where he seeks to elevate it to a level on par with Maslowian self-actualization. Peaceweaving is an impressive and an intensely personal marrying of two concepts that just don't normally roll off the tongue in any natural sequence: mediation and shamanism. Yes, shamanism. Not your typical mediation book. Not your typical mediator.
Hoffman's is a very personal narrative of his journey through a vast mediation career which parallels his own evolution into "Shaman cum Mediator". Yes, a shaman as mediator. Seems a bit far out there, but it is authentic, and it does have value for the profession.
For most practitioners in the conflict resolution field this might seem a bit of a reach, even implausible. For the hard core realists, this will be seen as pure flakiness, naivety wrapped in new age crystals and prayer flags. He speaks freely of his role as a mediator to eliminate negative energies and to move the conflicted parties' relationships towards one of "power with" the other party and away from "power over" the other party.
Hoffman is aspirational, unbelievably aspirational. But this is an approach that seeks to be transformational, not just adding a new tactical process to the conflict resolution field. Hoffman's career has led him to great challenges. This book is not so much about labour disputes and trade deals. Hoffman seeks to bring a new way of thinking to the most violent and protracted disputes of our times, and the ones just around the corner. This is a man who has looked straight into the eyes of African war lords who were responsible for mass killings, abducting children, and child soldiers, and he didn't blink (though he does admit to suffering from intense internal anxiety from time-to-time).
What will be comforting to traditionalists and realists who dare to read deeply enough into Hoffman's approach is that he understands that power is at the core of all conflict, and that failure to understand this is a critical error for any mediator at any level. It is all about power, but for Hoffman it is also about transforming how the parties relate to and use their power. Hoffman's view is that the greatest challenge is to transform the parties and their relationship with their power and the power dynamics in the conflict. This is where he seeks to transform the art of mediation. In this regard Hoffman's understanding of the challenges in mediation is spot on. He gets it: it is all about power and the parties' own beliefs about their relative power. He is no naïf in this regard.
Ultimately, Hoffman asks: what is my role as mediator? For him it can be as ambitious as seeking to alter and transform the core values of the parties in conflict. Pretty aspirational stuff (US foreign policy has been known to try the same). In Hoffman's view not all mediators will answer this question the same. Most will not likely answer like Hoffman. After all, he seeks to weave peace in the great violent conflicts of our times. The challenge of a commercial dispute does not raise the same transformational goal for him, nor should it. That's about commerce, not peace. Hoffman is dealing in human lives, human dignity, and transforming parties upward from years and decades of violence.
His proposal that mediators elevate their role to that of a shaman is indeed daring, bold, and even unthinkable. But that's what true visionaries and innovators do. A man on the moon in 1940? Unthinkable. The Berlin wall coming down in 1970? Unthinkable. Film clips and photos sent from mobile phone to mobile phone in 1980? Unthinkable. Mediator as Shaman? …unthinkable…?
Neil Patton is the co-founder and proprietor of Pre-think Inc. (see http://www.pre-think.com). Neil has worked in negotiations for over 20 years. He has been a chief negotiator, strategist, coach, and trainer. His practice covers a variety of negotiations (collective bargaining, procurement, sales/marketing, commercial contracts) and sectors (utilities, telecoms, health care, education, mining, military, social services, retail, land development).
Ben Hoffman co-founded the Canadian International Institute of Applied Negotiation in 1992 (see http://www.ciian.org). CIIAN is dedicated to the prevention and resolution of destructive conflict and to building sustainable peace at local, national, and international levels. Ben is the author of several important books on the subjects of negotiation and mediation. Ben has been, if not the official Peacehawks shaman, certainly our guru for as long as we've known him – and each other.
August 15, 2015 James Arbuckle	Hoffman, mediation, Negotiations, Patton	Leave a comment
Media Strategy in Peace Processes
- by Ingrid Lehmann
Many diplomats and others involved in the mediation of international conflicts tend to be reluctant to publicize details of their work and may prefer to stay entirely out of the media's limelight. While this approach has its merits during some negotiations, particularly in the early stages, in today's 24/7 information environment nothing stays confidential for long. It only is a matter of time before information leaks, sometimes at the initiative of the parties themselves. Increasingly, mediators find that an active media strategy becomes an essential element of their work. Such a public-information strategy will aim to build public support for the peace process, shape the public image of the international negotiator and avoid negative fallout from uncontrolled and misleading public exposure.
In 21st-century conflicts, there are not only professional reporters covering a conflict or emerging crisis, but countless interested observers. Some may be citizens 'bearing witness', who can create a 'story' through a short message, photo or video posted on the internet. Such news items can be picked up by the traditional media and may rapidly take on a life of their own. (1) For mediators it thus becomes vital to monitor relevant information channels and attempt to manage the news flow about their work in a proactive way. Seeking the 'information high ground', as in defining and enunciating the basic issues in the negotiations and avoiding unnecessary and contentious details, ought to become one of the goals of all active mediators.
May 14, 2015 James Arbuckle	Annan, Communications, Communications strategy, Information Management, Kenya, Kosovo, Media/information environment, mediation, Peace processes, Public Information, Public opinion, Rwanda, Target audiences	2 Comments
MEDITATING ON MEDIATING
LINES WRITTEN A FEW METRES ABOVE UNTERWASSERSTRASSE[i]:
Introduction and Background
The end of the Cold War did not, as we then so fondly hoped, usher in an era of peace. Although interstate wars may seem to have become relatively rare, intra-state conflict has become nearly constant and largely intractable. Armed force alone is of little value in resolving these lower-level but deadly conflicts – and intrastate wars have since the early Nineties been characterized by sickening casualty tolls.[ii] Alternate means of management and resolution of conflicts by non-violent methods have therefore been widely sought. These have, in some cases, offered real hope for the mitigation and even the prevention of conflict.
A resultant interest in the tools of mediation and negotiation continues to grow. The entire field which is generally referred to as alternate dispute resolution seems to present an attractive soft power tool box for the restoration and maintenance of peace. It has become an essential measure for containing, preventing and (hopefully) resolving conflict – non violently.
January 30, 2015 James Arbuckle	mediation	1 Comment
CAN CONGO BE SAVED FROM ITSELF?
Panel 3 of a Triptych for Peacehawks, by Jamie Arbuckle
On 6 November, the Army of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), with support from UN, Tanzanian and South African forces, defeated the rebel group M23. On 5 December, Nelson Mandela died. In one month, then, we have been confronted with the worst and the best of sub-Saharan Africa. Which is the true picture? Which represents the future of Africa? Are conflicts to be peacefully resolved, which we might call the Nelson Mandela Future Model, or are conflicts to be endlessly and brutally protracted, which we might call the Central African Future Model? Is there hope, or do we face merely a grim preparation for more of the same, in Africa south of the Sahara?
Is the Congo still at the heart of darkness, or is it the birthplace of the first great international human rights movement of the 20th Century?[1]
December 13, 2013 James Arbuckle	Charter of UN, Colonies, Congo, domestic jurisdiction, genocide, Hammarskjoeld, humanitarian intervention, Kobler, mediation, Rwanda, Uganda, UN, United Nations	Leave a comment
Trackless Diplomacy – At Play in the Fields of the Lord's Resistance Army
… the peacemaker must 'wage' peace.
– Ben Hoffmann
Peace Guerilla – unarmed and in harm's way, my obsession with ending violence
By Ben Hoffmann, Ph.D., The Canadian International Institute of Applied Negotiation, Ottawa, 2009 206 pp., $12.96 (Cdn)
A review for Peacehawks by Jamie Arbuckle
This book is the story of Ben Hoffman's efforts to end a nineteen-year old war between Sudan and Uganda. His chief instrument in this was the Nairobi Agreement, which had been mediated by former President Jimmy Carter in December, 1999. Ben, working on behalf of the Carter Center (http://www.cartercenter.org/homepage.html), was to oversee the implementation of the Agreement. To do so, he would have to end the guerilla war being waged by Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army against the Government of Uganda, from safe areas within and with the support of Sudan. Kony's LRA was an especially vile band, kidnapping children for "warriors" and "wives". Kony himself, as Ben makes graphically clear, was mad, bad and dangerous to know. And get to know him Ben did, with all that entailed. If you take nothing else from this reading, you will empathize with the courage and the self-reliance required for this sort of intervention.
February 24, 2010 James Arbuckle	Jimmy Carter, Joseph Kony, mediation, Negotiations, Sudan, The Carter Center, Track II Diplomacy, Uganda	Leave a comment
Managing Public Information in a Mediation Process
Buy or Download
Conflict Management and Resolution
Mediation and Facilitation
Post-Conflict Activities
Center for Mediation and Conflict Resolution
February 2009 Book by Ingrid A. Lehmann
Those who mediate international conflicts must communicate publicly with a wide variety of audiences, from governments and rebel forces to local and international media, NGOs and IGOs, divided communities and diasporas.
January 22, 2010 Ingrid Lehmann	Information Management, mediation, Negotiations, Public Information	Leave a comment


After recently reading Roger Kahn's book titled, "The Era 1947 – 1957", I was ready for another baseball experience. This book seems to pick up where the previous one left off, as the author follows the Dodgers' move from Brooklyn to Los Angeles and deals mostly with the decade of the 1960s. It is interesting to me that I also enjoyed this book immensely, even though I had stopped closely following baseball during this period since not only were the Dodgers no longer in Brooklyn, but I personally was totally absorbed in college, medical school and psychiatric training.
Perhaps the appeal of the book is that it is "inside baseball". The author describes the trials and tribulations of the personalities involved, but he also recounts the details of important games and even the individual at bats. He not only reports the various key baseball moments as they happened, but he subsequently has chatted with many of the key players 40 or 50 years later about various at bats or important plays in the field. Even if I were not following baseball closely during this decade, I was very familiar with certain heroes of the time and of prior years such as Sandy Koufax, who was one of my heroes as he started off and had a great career with the Brooklyn Dodgers before moving to Los Angeles.
The personalities of many players emerged in this book along with the indelible impression which they left on the game. For example, the author gets into the head of Maury Wills, the Dodgers' shortstop and fantastic base runner, as he traces his life and career in wonderful detail. As a psychiatrist, I could not help but enjoy learning about the personal life and baseball career of Wes Parker, who played first base for the Dodgers for eight years. The author told about Parker's family history coming from a rich family, his relationship with his parents, his insecurity despite his wonderful baseball career and the meaning that being a success in baseball had for him. He weaved Parker's history in and out of various chapters. He probably could have presented the full story of this man's life at a psychiatric meeting and received great acclaim.
The book not only told great baseball stories and let the reader relive key baseball moments mostly about the Dodgers, but it also brought memorable news events that were occurring in our country during this time period. This included the assassination of President John Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy, the civil rights movement and the impact of the Vietnam War. I could not put this book down and it was a great reading experience.
When the Yankees, the Giants and the Dodgers Ruled the World By Roger Kahn.
If you were living in New York and old enough to be a baseball fan during the time period 1947-1957, which this book covers, you will especially enjoy this book. Kahn who is a prolific sportswriter, best known for his classic Boys of Summer (1972) which was about the Brooklyn Dodgers, has been writing books for over 60 years. Can you imagine being a kid in a city where there are three major league baseball teams and frequently at least one and sometimes two will play in the World Series? When you are living through it, you take it for granted. But when you can look back on it, you realize what a unique experience it had been. Kahn, not only had the writing skills to take us back to that special era, but he has knowledge of the behind-the-scenes events, interactions and personalities of the people who starred in this era.
Before I go further, I must acknowledge that there was only one team that really mattered to me, and that was the Brooklyn Dodgers. My favorite players were Pee Wee Reese, the Dodgers' shortstop and Jackie Robinson. It was only years later as I grew up, did I fully appreciate the significance of Branch Rickey bringing Robinson to Brooklyn as the first black major league baseball player. But all the behind-the-scenes details are here and a lot more about the personalities and the events of the golden era of baseball.
It happened that my best friend's father got two tickets to the subsequent 1951 World Series that would now take place between the Giants and the Yankees (a famed Subway Series) and I was invited to go to the game with my friend. We took a subway to Coogan's Bluff where the Yankees played the Giants. I distinctly remember when a Yankee by the named Gil McDougal hit a grand slam homerun and neither my friend nor I were moved since we were shameless Dodger fans.
This is the type of book that will ignite memories in anyone who lived through this era. It will bring alive many events and personalities such as Willie Mays and his famous outfield "catch". Other persons that come to mind are "Joltin'" Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Leo Durocher, Charlie Dressen, Casey Stengal, Yogi Berra, Duke Snider, Carl Furillo, Phil Rizzuto, Mickey Mantle, Allie Reynolds, Joe Black, Roy Campanella, Walter O'Malley and many others.
This book was written in 1993 with an after foreword provided by the author in 2001, but it is a timeless book. It provides an account of the personalities and events of our national pastime "when the Yankees, the Giants and the Dodgers ruled the world".
Daniel James Brown is an author who describes himself as someone who writes narrative non-fiction which brings compelling historical events to life. That is exactly what he does in The Boys in the Boat. To most contemporary Americans, competitive rowing is not high on the list of sporting events to follow. Even if you have heard about the 1936 Berlin Olympics, you might only think of Jessie Owens, the black track star , who won a gold medal in the face of Hitler proclaiming his master race ideas. However, there is another story that you should know about those Olympic games .
This book tells the story of nine young men from the University of Washington who had an amazing journey that also took them to the 1936 Berlin Olympics to win a gold medal. It is about much more than their Olympic triumph. It is about what they needed to overcome and how they learned to work together in a manner which transcended the teamwork required for other sports. These young men came from farms, logging towns, and other difficult backgrounds. They struggled to get to the University of Washington and then to earn a spot on the rowing team. It is also a story about their coach, Al Ulbrickson and how he coached them and treated them as individuals and as a team. It is also about George Pocock, a boat-builder who not only built the rowing shell for the University of Washington team but also for most collegiate teams throughout the country. Pocock grew up in England and intimately understood rowing from his experience with the boats on the famous Thames River. It was his wisdom and support which sustained the University of Washington team almost as much as their esteemed coach.
Mr. Brown, the author, became interested in this subject when he had a discussion with a neighbor who was the daughter of one of these rowers. He ultimately met her father, Joe Rantz, a few years before he died. He heard this story firsthand and was able to review various documents and diaries not only of this man but of the other members of the rowing team as he was introduced to their families. The result is a book which reads like a page turning novel with events and insights into the people about whom the book was based.
There is a parallel story, which the author chooses to chronicle and which adds to the significance of the triumph of the University of Washington team at the 1936 Olympics. That is the events going on in Germany as Adolf Hitler came to power and began to oppress and ultimately murder the German Jews and others. The temporary easing up by Hitler of his cold-blooded extermination plans in order to deceive the world at his showcase Olympics, was clearly spelled out in this book.
I found the author's discussion of the German filmmaker, Leni Riefenstahl, quite interesting and revealing. She was given carte blanche by Hitler to film the Olympics from every angle in order to showcase Hitler's Germany in a glorious positive image for the entire world. She worked extremely closely with Hitler and Goebbels (the Nazi Propaganda Minister) and may have been literally in bed with them. She filmed all the athletes from the best angles, sometimes from specially built trenches so she could show the marching Germans from an upward looking view. Interestingly enough, after the American team from the University of Washington won their gold medal (in a most exciting well-described come from behind victory), she was given permission to bring her cameras into the University of Washington's boat for a special ride with them. The results can be seen in a well-preserved video of a preliminary heat won by Germany and the final won by the US for the gold medal (see YouTube video-English version or German narration version ) where she intermixes cuts of long views of the race with close ups of the rowers. Riefenstahl subsequently tried to distance herself from her close association with Hitler after the war ( see interview with Riefenstabhl). No matter what her culpability in Hitler's propaganda show, the wonderful video of these nine men, whose self-determination, hard work, and comradeship, was very well done and will allow future generations to enjoy watching their accomplishment.
One reviewer in Publishers Weekly called this book a Nautical Chariots of Fire, which seems a very apt description. It is also rumored that the Weinstein Brothers have optioned this book for a movie which may be soon available as you read this review. I am sure it will be an exciting film but this book alone captures a vivid picture of the Boys In The Boat that you will not forget.
In order to determine if you might like this book please take the following quiz. Match the names or phrases in column I with those in column II.There may be more than one answer for each entry in column I. Answers are at the end of the review.
There are 37 correct answers by my count. So if you get 12 or more correct , you are batting over 300 which I believe means that you will feel at home with this book. Likewise if you are of a certain age and followed baseball as a kid, chances are you will get great pleasure from this book. Finally, if you are younger than a certain age and just enjoy the history of baseball, you probably will find this book quite interesting.
The book focuses mainly on 1946, the year after the end of World War II but the author Robert Weintraub will frequently dip into the past for background or give some glimpses into what happened to various people years to come after this year. He also includes interesting tidbits about the Nurenberg Trials of Nazi war criminals that were going on during 1946 which are quite fascinating. The book also covers the war experiences of many prewar major leaguers who went off to war, some of whom came back to become household names as major league stars. There is also the account of some baseball players who went off to fight but did not come back or were never able to resume their careers.
1946 was also the year that Branch Rickey decided that he was going to integrate baseball and found a great UCLA athlete to be the baseball player to do it. In this year Jackie Robinson was made a member of the Dodger's number one farm team, the Montreal Royals. The account of this adventure and the final bringing Robinson into the big leagues the following season, is a good enough reason by itself to read this book. I thought I knew this story quite well but I never realized that when the club owners all voted upon whether to bring him into major league baseball, the vote was 15-1 against doing it with only Rickey voting yes. The account goes on to explain how Rickey was able to pull things off despite this vote by the other owners.
Ted Williams and all the nick names he was given is amply covered in several chapters of this book. The case is made that he probably was the greatest player of his generation despite a mercurial personality that was hard to understand. No doubt he was a great competitor and did mature during his career. He probably was the only player in baseball history who received a standing ovation when he decided to bunt down the third baseline. You may remember there was the "Williams Shift" where the infield was moved around to the right with a short right fielder in place since that is where powerful Williams would usually slam the ball. Williams was usually reluctant to take a nearly sure thing rather than try to power away and pull the ball. He also probably was close to all time high in walks since most pitchers were reluctant to pitch straightway to him anyway.
As someone who grew up in Brooklyn I was most familiar with the Brooklyn Dodgers with Yankees and Giants being also known to me. Even though I was well below my adolescence during the pivotal year of 1946 which this book centers upon, so many of the characters who played a role in this year continued their careers for at least another 8-10 years that they were well known to me. I will have to give credit to Red Barber, Connie Desmond and the then young Vin Sculley who were the Dodger radio announcers and always had great stories about all the players. While I had a familiarity with many of the key players I did not recall much about the pennant race of 1946 and particularly about the World Series. Author Weintraub provided all the details and laid them out as if they unfolding before the avid baseball fan that I was in my younger days. Sometimes, particularly in the World Series, I felt I was almost in the stands watching the Red Sox and Cardinals battle it out and somehow I had stake in the outcome.
The "piece de resistance" was the author's detailed description and even more detailed analysis of the "Mad Dash." This was the play where Enos "Country" Slaughter scored what turned out to be the winning run in the final game of the 1946 World Series, from first base on a base hit that was probably just a single by Harry "The Hat" Walker. Exactly how the ball was fielded by Leo Culberson and a microscopic analysis of how Johnny Pesky handled making the relay throw to the plate is only something a true lover of baseball could appreciate. If this is up your alley you are sure to enjoy this book.