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Taiwan says China can blockade its key harbours, warns of 'grave' threat
FILE PHOTO: Taiwanese domestically-built Indigenous Defense Fighters (IDF) take part in the live-fire, anti-landing Han Kuang military exercise, which simulates an enemy invasion, in Taichung
By Yimou Lee
TAIPEI (Reuters) – China's armed forces are capable of blockading Taiwan's key harbours and airports, the island's defence ministry said on Tuesday, offering its latest assessment of what it describes as a "grave" military threat posed by its giant neighbour.
China has never renounced the use of force to bring democratic Taiwan under its control and has been ramping up military activity around the island, including repeatedly flying war planes into Taiwan's air defence zone.
Taiwan's defence ministry, in a report it issues every two years, said China had launched what it called "gray zone" warfare, citing 554 "intrusions" by Chinese war planes into its southwestern theatre of air defence identification zone between September last year and the end of August.
Military analysts say the tactic is aimed at subduing Taiwan through exhaustion, Reuters reported last year.
At the same time, China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) is aiming to complete the modernisation of its forces by 2035 to "obtain superiority in possible operations against Taiwan and viable capabilities to deny foreign forces, posing a grave challenge to our national security", the Taiwan ministry said.
"At present, the PLA is capable of performing local joint blockade against our critical harbours, airports, and outbound flight routes, to cut off our air and sea lines of communication and impact the flow of our military supplies and logistic resources," the ministry said.
China views Taiwan as Chinese territory. Its defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen says Taiwan is already an independent country and vows to defend its freedom and democracy.
Tsai has made bolstering Taiwan's defences a priority, pledging to produce more domestically developed weapons, including submarines, and buying more equipment from the United States, the island's most important arms supplier and international backer.
In October, Taiwan reported 148 Chinese air force planes in the southern and southwestern theatre of the zone over a four-day period, marking a dramatic escalation of tension between Taipei and Beijing.
The recent increase in China's military exercises in Taiwan's air defence identification zone is part of what Taipei views as a carefully planned strategy of harassment.
"Its intimidating behavior does not only consume our combat power and shake our faith and morale, but also attempts to alter or challenge the status quo in the Taiwan Strait to ultimately achieve its goal of 'seizing Taiwan without a fight'," the ministry said.
To counter China's attempt to "seize Taiwan swiftly whilst denying foreign interventions", the ministry vowed to deepen its efforts on "asymmetric warfare" to make any attack as painful and as difficult for China as possible.
That includes precision strikes by long-range missiles on targets in China, deployment of coastal minefields as well as boosting reserve training.
(Reporting By Yimou Lee; additional reporting by Yew Lun Tian; editing by Robert Birsel)


sorry for the delay. I was swamped with RL, tiredness and other tasks and thus couldn't finish my intended release spree for the anniversary.
Well, not like it's too late either way, you get today another two chapters of Nidoume no Jinsei wo Isekai de.


Originally published as a three-volume set, this work now appears in one volume. In it the author deals with the very basic matters of the Christian faith and experience—the person and work of Christ, and how believers can grow in Him. She follows Mary McDonough's method as used in her book, God's Plan of Redemption, employing a diagram of three concentric circles to depict the tripartite nature of man. Paxon's unique contribution was to combine these in such a way as to show the stages of Christ's work and the believer's growth.
The Christian's Choice—Self or Christ?


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Malawi court sentences Chinese wildlife trafficking kingpin to 14 years in jail
NewsInternational NewsScience
NASA Released New Stunning Photos Of Dwarf Planet Ceres
(The AEGIS Alliance) – Ceres is the largest object in the asteroid belt that lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, slightly closer to Mars' orbit. Its diameter is approximately 945 kilometers, making it the largest of the minor planets within the orbit of Neptune. – Wikipedia
NASA recently released stunning close-up images of the mysterious dwarf planet Ceres, captured by a robotic probe named the Dawn spacecraft.
"These pictures are new to you and new to us too," stated Marc Rayman of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory located in Pasadena, California. "It's a wonderful flood of data." he mentioned.
Each 27 hours, NASA's Dawn spacecraft has been swooping down near the surface of Ceres to capture these close-ups. At Dawn's lowest point, the probe is only 22 miles above. In outer space, this is almost skimming the ground below.
The photo captures began on June 9; and so far, Dawn has captured "hundreds" of images, states Rayman, "exotic alien landscapes, scenes truly otherworldly."
The images are so recent, NASA researchers "haven't had time to analyze them yet," he said.
"But it's almost like we're seeing a different Ceres."
Norther Wall of Occator Craterl, from June 16th, 2018.
Space scientists already had knowledge that Ceres was something more than just a drab dead rock.
Dawn started orbiting the dwarf planet back in March 2015; even before it took the close-up photos, the spacecraft captured over 50,000 images, all taken from hundreds or even thousands of miles away.
Researchers mapped out the surface of Ceres. The researchers analyzed data gathered by the rest of Dawn's instruments. They discovered a cryo-volcano, salt flats, and an ancient Crater named Occator which spans 57 miles across. The researchers figured out that huge amounts of salt water that is almost all frozen, is hidden underground.
They also discovered organic materials—which are the "building blocks" to create life.
The latest data does indeed reveal a lot of organics: "One area of 3,700 acres, covered with it," Rayman said. "Five to ten times more prevalent than we thought was there."
Ice in northern wall of the Juling Crater. 240 miles above Ceres
A small boulder located on the surface of Ceres, captured by Dawn at an altitude of 24 miles.
Rayman, who is the chief engineer and mission director of the project, is still skeptical that Ceres contains life.
"It (life) is an extreme remote possibility," he stated.
"Ceres does have many of the ingredients we think are necessary for life—water, organics, a source of energy, internal geological forces." he mentioned, "But you need to combine the ingredients in the right way."
It is likely that Ceres does not hold life. Surface temperature in the daytime is at minus 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Any atmosphere is hardly even there, at best being transient.
A battered crater rim on Ceres. Image captured by Dawn from 25 miles away on June 10, 2018.
A photo of the southeastern wall of Occator Crater, captured by Dawn at an altitude of 22 miles above Ceres on June 17, 2018.
These close-up photos are to be the Dawn spacecraft's last; because it is running out of fuel. Under two gallons of hydra-zine remain.
"In this low-altitude orbit, we use the propellant much more quickly," Rayman said. "So it's going fast."
The hydra-zine could last a few more weeks, or maybe even a few months, but it will surely be depleted sometime around August and October.
When this happens, Dawn will die. "It won't be able to control its orientation, point its antenna to Earth, point its camera, or point the ion engine," Rayman stated.
Dawn will instead forever be in an endless orbit around Ceres.
Rayman has been with the mission for nearly 16 years, and holds feelings that are "bittersweet".
"Dawn was powered by the burning desire to know the cosmos," he said. "It's not just the ion propulsion that got us there."
But research never ceases. Generations of scientists to come, will download the data gathered by Dawn for decades from now in the future.
"The spacecraft won't continue. But its legacy will." Rayman mentioned.
An artist's impression of the Dawn spacecraft.
Kyle James Lee – The AEGIS Alliance – This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


A test flight from Real Tonga Airlines touched down at Faleolo International Airport as it looks to formalise a working relationship with Polynesian Airlines.
The 1 hour and 20 minutes flight from Vava'u brought to Samoa a delegation of more than 20 employees including the Deputy Chief Executive Officer and General Manager of Commercial, Tele Faletau.
At the airport to await the delegation was Polynesian Airlines Chief Executive Officer, Seiuli Alvin Tuala and members of his staff.
Seiuli declined to comment when he was asked.
But Mr. Faletau told the Samoa Observer their official regional service should be up and running by August.
"While a lot of people suggested Fiji, but for us, we've had a connection with Samoa for far too long," he said.
"This has always been our primary objective for our regional flights and that is flying to Samoa.
Mr. Faletau said Samoa and Tonga are next-door neighbours and it makes sense for them to work together.
But the plan to revive Polynesian Airlines international operations is exciting.
"We have a lot of Tongas here in Samoa and there are a lot of Samoans in Tonga.
"To get between Samoa and Tonga, is very costly to customers over $2,000 and on top of that required an overnight and that didn't matter which way you went, whether it's Fiji, or NZ," he said.
"So now we're going to offer a much more cost effective option for the traveling public and a much more convenient services... the airfare will be less than $1,000WST, because the flight is just over an hour.
"All the flights will come through Vava'u, the flight time that was discovered today [yesterday] was an hour and 20 minutes.
The Deputy C.E.O agrees there are more Tongas in Pago Pago however due to significant federal regulations they are depending on Polynesian Airlines to bring over the passengers from American Samoa.
Earlier this week, Polynesian Airlines formalized its partnership with Fiji Airways in a Memorandum of Understanding.


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Der National Highway 2 (NH 2) ist eine von acht National-Fernstraßen in Kambodscha. Sie bildet eine Nord-Süd-Verbindung im Süden des Landes von der Hauptstadt Phnom Penh bis Phumi Tônleab bei Phnom Den an der Grenze zu Vietnam. Die Straße ist 120 km lang.

Straßenbeschreibung
Der NH 2 beginnt im Süden der 2 Millionen Einwohner großen Hauptstadt Phnom Penh. Hier kreuzt sie den National Highway 1, die Straße nach Ho-Chi-Minh-Stadt in Vietnam. Der NH 2 ist eine schmale zweispurige Straße, die entlang des Ufers des Bassac-Flusses führt. Der erste Teil der Straße führt durch dicht besiedeltes Gebiet der Vororte von Phnom Penh, bevor sie in die ländlichen Bereiche Kambodschas führt. Sie führt durch weite, flache, landwirtschaftlich genutzte Flächen. Auf der Strecke gibt es nur vereinzelte Gebäude, aber keine Ortschaften mit Ausnahme von Takeo. Kurz vor der Grenze zu Vietnam befindet sich der Ort Phumi Tônleab bei  Phnom Den. Auf der vietnamesischen Seite führt die QL91 weiter nach Long Xuyên.

Geschichte
Die Fernstraße wurde zum Zeitpunkt der französischen Kolonialzeit gebaut und ist inzwischen befestigt. Sie hat deutlich weniger Verkehr als der NH 1, da sich an der Strecke kaum größere Städte befinden, auch nicht auf der vietnamesischen Seite.

Weblinks
 Informationen auf wegenwiki.nl (niederländisch)

Nationalstrasse Kambodscha002
Nationalstrasse 2

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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Remain or Leave? When The Brexit Conundrum Involves Fashion
Fashion designers and brands rarely show their allegiance to a political cause as they know that it may damage their business. That said, we have seen fashion shows that were turned into protests or in which certain issues were subtly tackled via a specific colour or print, or fashion designers who are not afraid to make their views known. Julian Dunkerton from Superdry is among them: the multimillionaire and founder of the popular brand recently donated £1m to the People's Vote, a cross-party group including some MPs, currently demanding a new referendum on Britain's potential exit from the European Union.
Dunkerton, 53, started his career into fashion from a stall in Cheltenham in the 1980s and then launched iconic brand Cult. Around 15 years ago, he developed the idea for the Superdry label after a trip to Japan with designer and co-founder James Holder and the first shop followed in 2004. Eight years ago Superdry was floated on the Stock Exchange and at the moment there are over 500 Superdry outlets scattered in 46 countries (over 130 stores are based in the UK).
Dunkerton's personal fortune amounts to £441m and his decision to donate money to the People's Vote campaign may be easily seen as dictated by financial reasons: Brexit would indeed have a disastrous impact on the free movement of (people and) goods. For what regards the fashion industry, many brands in the UK source their materials and produce their garments in EU countries and their workforce comes from all over the world, so this is just one of the many industries that would be hit by Brexit.
The entrepreneur's decision, though, may not be dictated by merely financial reasons as he sold off a portion of his shares in Superdry and he's not actually new to donations to causes in which he genuinely seems to believe in (he transferred more than £1m in Superdry shares to the Blue Marine Foundation, a charity combating over-fishing and the destruction of biodiversity).
Dunkerton, who defines himself as "non-party political", is a strict Remainer, publicly criticised Boris Johnson while the politician led the Leave campaign and often spoke about the effects of Britain exiting the EU. According to the millionaire, if Brexit had happened 20 years earlier, Superdry would have never happened and it would have never been a success, the current policy on customs and tariffs and the single market allowed indeed the brand to focus on expansion in all sorts of European countries.
Brexiters and Eurosceptics claimed Dunkerton is just another wealthy person trying to overturn the democratic decision and the will of the British people, highlighted how Superdry's garments are not made in Europe, but in Asia and the Middle East (Young Independence, UKIP's youth wing, stated on Twitter: "Superdry pouring money made from slave labour into the PeoplesVote campaign"; not to defend Superdry, but a lot of politicians and political parties receive funds and money donations from private sources, among them businessmen, which means they should also question where the money of their supporters comes from...), and called for a Superdry boycott.
Still you wonder if the outcomes of the Brexit referendum in June 2016 can be called as democratic results when you consider that the Leave campaign thrived on fear of immigration, Cambridge Analytica and the leaders of the Leave.EU group worked together during the Brexit campaign and there is the possibility that Russia influenced the Brexit vote. Many of the voters never considered the real consequences of leaving the EU, such as losing funds for a wide range of projects or deliveries of supplies going from drugs to medicines getting stuck at customs control (without even taking into consideration the personal situation of millions of European people living and working in the UK and of British expats in the EU).
Hard Brexiters' may insist on a no deal, but, even if you didn't want to believe in the dramatic consequences of Brexit, the fact that certain brands and industries are moving their branches overseas to Ireland or Germany to establish a European base, should make you think (they are clearly leaving the ship before it sinks...).
For what regards the People's Vote campaign, time issues are a cause of concern: there may be indeed not enough time to organise another vote before March 2019, when Britain will stop being a EU member, besides Tory and Labour leaders do not like the idea of a new referendum.
The campaign is hoping to get enough MPs to back a referendum on the deal Prime Minister Theresa May strikes with Brussels, due to be put to a vote in Parliament in October (a mass march against Brexit is scheduled to take place in central London on 20th October). Dunkerton's donation, the largest received by the People's Vote, will go towards funding opinion polls and the publication of "gold-standard" surveys of more than 10,000 voters at a time.
Dunkerton is not the only billionaire who has expressed concerns about Brexit: Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group, does not support Brexit and recently stated the British people were misled in the 2016 vote. Dunkerton may have done a risky choice by publicly donating his money and revealing his personal opinion (but then again political parties all over the world receive funds and money donations from private sources), but in life you can't always make everybody happy and you're always likely to get some angry backlash from people who do not agree with you on something. Dunkerton's choice was almost brave in an industry in which not many people like to stand up for a cause, fearing of losing consumers' money and support.
Dunkerton seemed to have clear ideas about what to do with his money, but now, if he fears there may be a shortage of inspirations at Superdry, he can maybe turn to the sweater that Margaret Thatcher donned in 1975 in support of the European trade agreement (and she wasn't certainy pro-Europe...). Already relaunched in 2016 by another brand, the sweater featured the flags of the nine countries (Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, West Germany, Ireland, Denmark, and the United Kingdom) that made up the common market at the time and still represents a basic, but visually striking and silent yet eloquent message.
In The Open Arms of Mercy: Fabio Viale's "Souvenir Pietà (Madre)" in Lampedusa, Italy
In yesterday's post we looked at the debate around an arty poster for a regatta considered as a political attack to the policies of the Italian Minister for Interior Affairs, Matteo Salvini.
You can bet that the debates will continue but will also be shifted onto other artists and works. At the moment the Interior Minister is indeed engaged in a new war and theatening to send back to Libya 177 migrants rescued by Italian coast guard ship Diciotti.
Italy asked Malta to take them, but the Maltese authorities refused highlighting the ship was not in distress and the migrants preferred continuing their journey towards Italy.
Yesterday Salvini demanded other European countries to take in the migrants and threatened to send them back to Lybia, a solution that may have legal repercussions on Italy as using the country's own ships to return migrants to Libya is in violation of the civil and political rights as assessed by the European Court of Human Rights.
As the odyssey of the migrants continues, Lampedusa is getting ready for a performance by Fabio Viale that will take place on the local beach on 23rd and 24th August.
Organised with the support of the local authorities and the Galleria Poggiali, the performance is entitled "Souvenir Pietà (Madre)" (Souvenir Pietà (Mother)) and it a development of a 2007 project, "Souvenir Pietà (Cristo)" (Souvenir Pietà (Christ)).
Both the projects consists in 1:1 replicas of Michelangelo's Pietà, but in the early version Viale reproduced Christ without the Mother and in the second and more recent version, the Mother was represented without the Son, hinting in this way at the sorrow of separation.
The statue of the Mother without the Son was also employed for the conceptual project "Lucky Ehi", presented last year in Milan: in this case the artist asked to a young man from Nigeria he had met in a refugee centre in Turin to pose in the place of Christ.
The contrasts in "Lucky Ehi" were striking: the white marble of the static Madonna statue held the living body of a man of colour, a modern representation of a suffering Christ, but at the same time a metaphor for somebody who found peace after a troubled life, while the statue became a universal symbol, a mother for all sorts of children with no distinctions of cultures and religious beliefs, an ancestral icon with a modern global power. The installation was accompanied in that case by an audio recording in which young refugee Lucky Ehi told his story and recounted how he flew from his country because of religious persecution.
The statue of Mother without Christ will land on Lampedusa's beach on Thursday this week and will be looking towards Lybia, her empty but open arms ready to welcome people, sons and daughters arriving in pain from all sorts of places, seeking love, comfort and support.
As seen in previous posts, Viale plays a lot with visual illusions, misperceptions, juxtapositions and contrasts between classical art and urban moods. At the moment Viale is exhibiting at the Glyptothek Museum in Munich, at the Battistero del Duomo and at the Galleria Poggiali in Pietrasanta, Italy, but this is the first time one of his works is presented in a very symbolic public space in Italy, in a performance that will certainly raise the debate on the current Italian policies about migrants and human rights. Will "Souvenir Pietà (Madre)" enrage Salvini, so busy at the moment with his ethnic cleansing campaign? Hopefully yes, after all that's what art should do - irritate big powers, question their decisions and prompt more people to think.
All images in this post by Nicolò Taglia
All in the Same Boat, But No Safe Port, Not Even for Art: Marina Abramović X Barcolana
If, while complaning to somebody about modern life you conclude your chat with the words "we're all in the same boat", you would receive sympathetic nods of agreement. This well-known expression is indeed used in all sorts of languages and cultures to define the human condition, we're all indeed subjected to the fortunes and misfortunes of life, no matter who we are and where we come from. Yet, for some people, we're definitely not on the same boat, as showed by the war around the arty Barcolana poster featuring Marina Abramović.
The Barcolana is a famous international regatta taking place in October in Trieste, and the war surrounding it started in July when the poster commissioned to artist Marina Abramović was finally unveiled.
In the poster Marina Abramović, dressed in a minimalist black shirt with matching trousers can be seen flying a flag and looking at the horizon. On the flag there's a simple message "We're all on the same boat".
The poster, a project co-ordinated by illycaffè creative director Carlo Bach and produced by the Barcolana Art Director Matteo Bartoli (Basiq), also features a graphic design that calls to mind the geometries of nautical flags, evoking the practice of ship dressing ("Gran Pavese") and triangles reminiscent of sails.
Hate or love Abramović, the poster, commissioned to the artist by the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano (Barcola and Grignano Sailing Club) to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Barcolana with the support of illycaffè (a famous coffee brand well-known for its interest in the art world) doesn't look too bad nor it can be deemed offensive in any way.
The organisers explained indeed in a press release that the theme is very simple: even when we're on board of different boats in a competition, we're still sailing on the same planet that should be preserved and protected day after day. To do it properly we should leave aside any kind of individualisms and behave as if we were part of one and only team taking part in a regatta. The Chairman of the Società Velica di Barcola e Grignano, Mitja Gialuz stated he was fascinated by this message as it perfectly represented the idea of 2,000 boats sharing the same experience all together in a unique competition. You can't really disagree with him and with the ideas behind the poster that seem to be extremely easy to grasp as there's nothing conceptual behind the image, but the message points at team spirit, protecting the environment and spreading a positive vibe.
Yet the poster ended up causing a scandal: when it was first unveiled in July, the deputy mayor of Trieste, Paolo Polidori, from the (racist, fascist, xenophobic and homophobic) League party, stated that the poster was being used to make a political comment about migrants and NGO boats in the Mediterreanean and was therefore an attack against the Minister for Interior Affairs Matteo Salvini (also from The League).
Highlighting how the poster was "horrifying" in this political climate during which Salvini is busy "cleansing the Mediterranean" (his words and a clear reference to ethnic cleansing...), Polidori launched a counter slogan "Ciccio is not for boat", showing his limited knowledge of the English language and extreme narrow-mindness. The sentence is indeed the literal translation of a Trieste proverb "Ciccio no xe per barca" referred to the "Cici", the inhabitants of an area of former Yugoslavia located near Fiume, who usually went to Trieste to sell coal; they were not skilled sailors, so the proverb referred to the fact that these people "were not cut out for the sea" (literally "not made for the boat").
The deputy mayor then announced he was going to take his revenge by rechecking the agreements between the City Hall of Trieste and the Barcolana and eventually suspending funds and permits for the event.
Art critic Daniele Radini Tedeschi also hit hard against Abramović: trying to find conceptual meanings behind the poster, Tedeschi interpreted the nautical flags as references to the geometries of Russian Constructivism and the colours of Suprematism. Red was obviously a reference to Communism (mind you, he didn't notice the black shirt that could be a reference to fascists...) and to the links between Abramović's parents and Yugoslav leader Tito. Tedeschi went even further explaining that, Danica and Vojin Abramović were considered as heroes and received a medal from Tito, who invaded Trieste in 1944, deporting and killing over 10,000 Italians during the foibe massacres.
Now, leaving aside all the nasty comments and over-conceptual readings of the poster, all debates may have been sorted out by checking a few things: the theme of the Barcolana advertising campaign was announched in June last year; the image was produced between January and February, while the Italian elections took place in March. The new Italian government was sworn in in at the very end of May after a deadlock of several months.
Salvini started closing ports and blocking the arrival of migrants in June, which shows there are no connections between the advertising campaign and the government. Yet, even if there had been a connection with Salvini's aggressive policies and a critical message for the government, artists should be free to say whatever they want without the fear of being criticised; they can rebel against a system and they should do so, making a comment through their works. But this doesn't suddenly seem to be possible at the moment for artists in Italy.
A few months ago Gaetano Pesce's bleeding cruficied Italy - originally finished in 1978 when Italy was suffering during the Lead Years and then displayed at the Venice Art Biennale in 2011 (when it may have been easily read as an attack to Berlusconi's Italy) was also criticised by another representative of The League party when it was showcased in an exhibition dedicated to the designer, as, according to him, it offended the religious sensibilities of people. For the artist and designer who created it and for art lovers the work represents instead a country suffering for many reasons and it is not meant to be as a piece that offends anybody.
Marina Abramović has suddenly become a subversive and politically engaged artist, while Polidori showed all the absurdity of today's narrow-minded local politicians. He didn't even realise the possibility of cashing in on a big name such as Abramović's, eventually stating the image will be banned from the walls of Trieste, but also from the flyers, the invitations and the brochures of the event (but the Barcolana organisers still claim they want to use it for its national and international advertising campaigns).
Repressing a poster because it annoys you can be read in a very simple way, this is an act of fascism and censorship; in this case you could even read it as an attack against a woman artist since, after working with Michelangelo Pistoletto, Gillo Dorfles and photographer Maurizio Galimberti for previous editions of the Barcolana, illycaffé opted for Abramović. Shame that Polidori didn't see the universal message and the common destiny behind boats and the sea, easy metaphors that can be grasped by everybody but definitely not by fascists. Maybe the poster should be accompanied by an asterisk stating "Honi soit qui mal y pense". As for me, well, I don't think the poster is as political as they're claiming, it looks indeed like the 1966 Supershell A campaign by Elio Petri, but then I'm not a fascist and I don't support The League party, I'm just an ordinary person who likes art.
PS Trieste's deputy mayor doesn't want the Barcolana poster to be seen in and outside Trieste, so retweet it as much as you can.
The Impacts of The Culture of Returns & That Perfect Hashtag Moment
If you're an independent retailer selling stuff on e-commerce sites such as Amazon, you may have experienced some strange consumer behaviour. An independent retailer selling on Amazon recently told me a consumer bought a DVD from them. The item was shipped and arrived in the expected time frame. A few days later the consumer contacted the seller saying he was returning the DVD because it was "No longer needed" and was therefore asking for a refund. Now, that doesn't sound like a good excuse to get one's money back, but it is clearly a case of trading rules being misused by a customer: if the item had been faulty or had arrived broken due to the packaging or was in another language or format than the one originally ordered and hadn't been unpacked yet, a return and a refund would have been perfectly understandable, but, when you buy a film on Amazon, you open the box and watch it, well, you should remember you haven't hired it for a few days, you have actually bought it.
The culture of returns, though, is rife at the moment for what regards all sorts of items, especially clothes and accessories. Fashion-wise the "try before you buy" option offered by some e-commerce sites has opened up the opportunity for many retailers to let consumers test a garment or an accessory in the comfort of their house rather than in a badly lit changing room. The items can then be returned without paying for them if they don't fit or if the consumer is not genuinely convinced about them.
While the experiment has its benefits as a consumer may want to think more about an item and purchase only the ones they really like, those retailers who support this scheme (or are planning to support it in 2019 and extend it to a variety of other goods including technology and homeware) should consider the perils of the "intentional returns".
According to surveys there is indeed a high percentage of consumers aged between 18 and 24 in the UK that go for the "try before you buy" option with the intention of returning some items or they are accustomed to order more things than they actually want to purchase.
The practice is probably also encouraged by certain habits developed after spending too much time on social media and maybe looking too much at pics with the hashtag "Outfit of the Day" (#OOTD).
Mainly launched by early fashion blogs around 10-12 years ago, the definition "Outfit Of The Day" was usually accompanied by a picture of the above-mentioned blogger presenting their styling suggestions with what they had in their wardrobes or what they could actually buy.
As the years passed, some high profile bloggers turned influencers and were co-opted by the fashion system and plied with presents. The stakes became higher, with outfits of the day posted on blogs and on Instagram starting to include luxury garments and accessories and portraying a lifestyle that most people can obviously not be able to afford.
Proper collaborations with brands meant that even more images of outfits were produced accompanied by the hashtag #OOTD. Maybe tired of watching, maybe hoping to become influencers themselves and, hopefully, of being pampered with free trips and clothes, ordinary followers started posting images of various outfits of the day.
The problem is that most of us do have limited wardrobes and even when you remix their contents endlessly, it is simply impossible to compete with high profile influencers. This has generated consumption-oriented postings, while staring continuously at pics of people holidaying, eating at fancy restaurants or posing in luxury goods and clothes, had a psychological impact on social media users, putting on them pressure to emulate their Instagram heroes and triggering feelings of inferiority, low self-esteem and anxiety.
The solution therefore for many influencer wannabes, came in the form of the "try before you buy" option with many people returning the items after snapping a picture of themselves in those particular outfits, a practice that devalues clothes and shows that we even buy things that we don't like as long as we can take a pic of ourselves in something new.
The emerging trend has been highligted by a research carried out by Barclaycard (they already carried out another survey focused on the same topic in 2016). Results were unveiled last week and showed that almost one in ten shoppers in the UK bought clothes to post photos on social media and then returned the items. Andy Warhol's proverbial "15 minutes of fame" seem like an eternity compared to the super instant and super quick kick that a hashtag moment can give you.
Apparently there are more 35-44 year-olds into this practice and men spend more money on fashion than women, they are also more embarrassed to be seen in the same outfit twice, so they are also more inclined to wear clothes without removing the price tags to have the option to try and return them.
According to the survey, more than three in ten Brits stated they are more likely to return items they purchase online using "try before you buy" because they don't have to pay for the item beforehand.
In a press release George Allardice, Head of Strategy, Barclaycard Payment Solutions said: "It's interesting to see the social media trend further fuelling the returns culture. We know from our research that returns are having a big impact on retailers, with a huge figure of seven billion pounds a year in sales that they potentially can't recognise."
In the same press release there are suggestions to fight our collective virtual vanity, by buying more versatile pieces that can be cleverly remixed, by becoming more aware of what kind of garments suit us or by taking pictures of ourselves from different angles to see if an outfit really works. Yet, if you're an impenitent fashionista, you could also check second-hand shops and vintage retailers, or find your own personal style and create a uniform by recycling what's hiding in a friend or a relative's wardrobe (never underestimate the potential of granny/auntie's style...).
The final suggestion is more drastic, though: take a break from social media, detox yourself from the #OOTD hashtag, stop following certain influencers and remember that some of them are promoting a lifestyle that simply doesn't exist. In a nutshell, you're more real than them, so establish your own style.
For what regards fashion retailers, Allardice suggests instead further systems to help consumers checking if they genuinely want an item: "Retailers are adopting new processes to make returns easier as they know how important this is to customers. But to ensure shoppers are getting more wear out of their clothes - for posting on social media or for those real-life moments - retailers could think about introducing more varied photography and video content to their websites. By showing how to style items for different looks and how they will appear when worn, they could reduce the number of shoppers 'snapping and sending back'."
Yet retaliers (especially small ones) should maybe also try and start thinking about ways to protect themselves from the culture of returns: it is not a secret that small e-commerce businesses trying to adapt to the flexible return policies offered by e-commerce giants such as Amazon suffer huge financial damages at times such as January, when consumers tend to return unwanted (but used) Christmas gifts. Coping with fast-changing consumer attitudes is hard for such retailers, so more regulations about tracking returns should be introduced to check upon those consumers who may have become experts in the culture of returns.
Will Consumers' Need for Authenticity and Trust Slow Down the Influencers' Market?
As you may remember from a previous post, last November Condé Nast Italia launched its first Social Academy to train influencers. The first course was based on influencers hoping to work in the Beauty market, while in May a new course started, this time revolving around Lifestyle (so they probably taught students how to produce more pictures of hotels, swimming pools, restaurants and dreaded overhead food photos, plus people bicycling in exotic locations or doing extreme sports – yawn).
Around the same time Condé Nast Italia launched its Social Academy, fashion commentator, publisher, educator and trend forecaster Li Edelkoort released her S/S 19 trend report, highlighting that influencers will more or less disappear in two years' time.
A recent research may prove that Edelkoort is probably right: two weeks ago global digital marketing consultancy Bazaarvoice issued indeed a press release with the results of a survey (carried out between June and July 2018) that involved 4,000 consumers from across Europe (2,000 consumers interviewed in the UK; 2,000 in the French and German markets). The survey showed that consumers are fatigued by the repetitive nature of content (47%) and by the dipping quality (23%) of influencer created contents.
Besides 55% of the people interviewed feel that the contents are too materialistic, while 54% state that they misrepresent real life. In Germany 32% of respondents even highlighted that influencers do not promote ethical behaviour.
Age seems to be an "influence on the influencer": 40% of millennials class the role of a social media influencer as a full-time job; consumers over the age of 35 don't seem to agree (24%; it is not that older people can't see the opportunity of social media, it's just that they have lived longer and know that this gig is not going to last...).
There are more interesting results when it comes to actual sales: 92% of European consumers interact with influencers, but around half of these (43%) have yet to make a purchase based on such a recommendation.
There are actually controversial details also showing that consumers (49% from the UK; 68% from France) follow more influencers than they used to but expect new content on a daily basis from them, something that puts pressure on production to remain authentic and high quality. It is undeniable that content suffers when you have to create more and more images to keep your followers entertained (not to mention the importance of numbers that allow you to get more visibility and more contracts from brands, meaning that some influencers have also turned to the practice of purchasing fake followers).
It is undeniable that influencers and brands play on very basic psychological tricks including the repeated exposure to something (think about Vêtements' knitted sock-trainers - when they came out they didn't look so beautiful, but now, available in their original configuration, reinterpreted by other brands or simply in their counterfeit version, they look acceptable to the human eye and extremely desirable), instilling in the viewer positive and familiar feelings. In a nutshell, you see a bag or a pair of shoes on someone (a celebrity, an influencer and then a friend) and you start craving for them, in the meantime the accessories become fashionable, trendy, familiar, recognisable and desirable, so you must simply HAVE it.
In pre-social media times, a trend started when somebody around us (think about school friends) started wearing something like a pair of shoes by a particular brand and everybody jumped on the same bandwagon, but now it feels as if somebody was imposing a specific trend globally on all consumers, from Asia to the States, passing through Europe.
Instagram posts looked rather intriguing at the very beginning, but soon things went out of control with sponsored adverts and content: at the very beginning people following specific fashion influencers would see in their feeds the above-mentioned influencers in the most extraordinary outfits, in exotic places or at runway shows. Things started in an original way, but now they have become rather contrived, especially when the same fashion house gave the same item to a series of influencers who then proceeded to saturate the market with images of that same item accompanied by the same hashtag (see the "Dior Saddle Bag-Gate").
As highlighted in previous posts, in some cases influencers forgot to flag the content as sponsored or as an advert for a specific fashion brand; in others they showed they didn't know the rules and regulations regarding certain issues.
A few months ago for example the Blonde Salad's Chiara Ferragni fell in a terrible trap when she ranted (on her Instagram account) about a brand of powder milk she uses for her baby, proving she didn't know much about law and advertising since it is illegal since 2009 to advertise baby products such as artificial milk in Italy (the post was promptly removed, even though the influencer was probably aiming it at her audience in the US, where it is not illegal to advertise such products).
But the situation is quite often complicated: a while back Louis Vuitton launched its #MakeAPromise campaign in support of UNICEF initiatives in Syria. The brand launched a necklace and a bracelet with a silver Lockit and recently came up with the bracelet in five new colours (the brand vows to donate USD$100 to UNICEF with every purchase of the Silver Lockit Colour bracelet). On Instagram the #MakeAPromise initiative produces quite a few images, some of them "curated" by influencers that make you wonder if they are spontaneous pics or orchestrated ones (each bracelet is $250, and there are at least 4 or 5 in the pics posted by a few prominent influencers around the globe which makes you suspect they are actually orchestrated images) .
Sure, as stated in a previous post, influencers must pay bills too, but it looks like they may have more bills than ordinary people or they are accepting all sorts of sponsoring gigs to get more visibility.
This means that the believability of influencers is into question and the next step will be working towards improving the quality and authenticity of the content they produce or imposing stricter rules for both brands and influencers (a better adeherence to guidelines established by dedicated organisations including the Federal Trade Commission in the U.S. or the Advertising Standards Authority and the Competition and Markets Authority in the United Kingdom, would be a start).
Yet, given the fact that we all seem to trust customer product reviews over the opinion of well-known influencers (after all, when booking a room somewhere we often read customer reviews, we don't go and check if this or that influencer has been there; mind you, there are services that offer hotels and B&Bs the possibilities to purchase positive reviews in the same way you can buy followers, so you should always try and be careful even with reviews ...), so, who knows, maybe in future brands may start considering the possibility of using real, more anonymous and reliable yet less prominent people as influencers. As usual, time will tell, but, if things do not change, Li Edelkoort may end up being right. In brief, give the hype another two years, before some influencers will have to find a real job.
The Ideal Candidate for the Italian Left? Miuccia Prada for President
On Monday the New York Post found a great solution to sell more papers – adding a wraparound ad with the Supreme red logo on a white background. The trick - using a cool and highly desirable New York City brand to sell papers - worked pretty well and the newspaper turned into an immediate success going sold out pretty quickly, with some newstands selling 50 copies in one go. Some people added the paper to their Supreme collections, others rushed to resell it online.
It was the first time the New York Post went for such type of promotion, but it wasn't the first "collaboration" for Supreme, that has so far worked with popular brands such as Fila, Nike, Rimowa and Levi's, or luxury fashion houses like Louis Vuitton and even issued a limited run of Supreme-branded subway cards in partnership with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York.
Each Thursday Supreme releases new products, included limited edition designs that prompt consumers to line up outside its stores, the tangible proof that whatever Supreme touches sells well, so it was only natural for the Supreme x New York Post promotional cover wrap to become another must-have. In a nutshell, the hype sells, even better than the news (Monday's edition of the New York Post wouldn't have gone sold out if the advert hadn't been there...), which brings us to the main theme of this post.
Since Italy's populist leaders Luigi Di Maio (Five Star Movement) and Matteo Salvini (The League), found an agreement to form the (most right wing) government of Italian history, there has been an increase in racist attacks. They were obviously denied by the Minister of the Interior Salvini, who, more or less like US President Trump, seems to have more time than any other mortal to spend on Twitter, posting silly messages. Salvini spent the last 10 years navigating through life thanks to a series of T-shirts and sweatshirts with slogans that told him what to do (from "No Euro" to "I'm a populist", from "Stop The Invasion" - referred to migrants - to "No Sanctions to Russia", just to mention a few ones).
Salvini's speeches are collages of random sentences, so that if you watch them remixed by some clever YouTuber, you will struggle to understand which is the real speech and which is the remixed and satirical one.
Salvini hates migrants as, according to him, they are part of a larger scheme to replace Italians with other cultures; he denies he's racist and fascist, but uses Mussolini's slogans; he likes to invoke divine interventions brandishing rosary beads and gospel books at political rallies and loves a traditional family with a mother and a father (that's why he had children from three different women, because, if you love a family, you tend to have more than one...). Mind you, there is something that the Minister for Interior Affairs abhors: the possibility that Elsa (out of Disney's "Frozen") may reveal herself as a lesbian character (the only reason why I would go and watch the sequel to "Frozen") and Coca-Cola as the popular fizzy drink supports Gay Pride events, so Salvini publicly tends to claim he prefers olive oil to Coke (maybe he thinks olive oil is a drink and not a condiment, but I'm just guessing here...).
Yet this half-wit Minister who has recently been banned from Mallorca as "persona non-grata" (thank you, Mallorca) for his statements and policies against migrants, appeals to a large section of the population and everytime he post a demented tweet he receives friendly messages form his supporters (both the real and the myriad of fake ones probably linked to Russian bots, as Salvini is a friend of Putin).
Why is that so? Well, the answer is an easy one: Italy has gone through dark decades of ignorance under Berlusconi who sowed the seeds of idiocy in a consistent way. When the centre left went back into power it didn't know how to speak to their voters, or how to reach out to new voters. In the meantime the Five Star Movement started using social media and blogs, connecting with the technological orphans of Silvio Berlusconi, while The League started a massive campaign against migrants seen as a menace. Salvini, and together with him Di Maio, the only Minister of Labour and Employment in the world who never had a proper job in his life, appeal to a generation of Italians who never read a book, grew up believing in Berlusconi's utopia, tend to blame migrants for more or less everything and think that science is dangerous and doctors suggesting to vaccinate your baby are criminals who can be lynched online.
As you may guess, it is almost impossible for the left/centre left to attract the voters' attention while the country is going berserk (among the other champions of political dementia in the current government there is the homophobic Minister for Family Affairs Fontana who seems to have read The Handmaid's Tale getting to the conclusion that it is a political manual rather than a piece of dystopian fiction...).
Yet there is a way out: finding a candidate that appeals to the majority of people, especially those ones who believe in amplified slogans rather than in politics and truth. And here's where Supreme comes to mind – the hype sells. Hence the left has got to find someone representing the hype. Where should the ideal candidate come from? Well, the fashion world.
Yes, the Italian fashion industry has traditionally been conservative if not overtly right wing (the Fontana sisters were very Conservatives; Dolce & Gabbana often claimed they are right-wing supporters; Santo Versace, Gianni's brother, was an MP for Berlusconi's party until 2011), but, as a young woman, Miuccia Prada joined the Italian Communist Party and became a feminist and her brand has the sort of status that appeals to the masses.
In a nutshell, if ordinary people elected Berlusconi over twenty years ago as they thought he represented a self-made man, successful entrepreneur and supposedly charming (eugh!) womaniser (well, he wasn't entirely self-made, but that's what people thought...), and if they voted for ranting and often clueless candidates from the Five Star Movement promising impossible things and for Salvini, a man who uses his garments as ordinary people use a GPS - to navigate through a meandering situation using a simplified system of messages - they would elect also Miuccia, who could be a sort of ambassador (yes, just like actresses become ambassadors for fashion houses).
I know what you're thinking: I'm solving a serious problem in a very superficial way, but superficiality is the keyword in our society and voting for Prada may achieve the same status that a Prada keychain may give you when you don't have enough money to buy anything else (you can't buy the bag or the shoes – oh, but you've voted for her and this is sooo cool). So, never mind the programme (that will follow anyway...), the hype is what counts.
The New York Post sold papers by wrapping them up in an ad; we may wrap freedom and a political programme in a fashion brand (after all the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower highlighted that politics is like fashion and you can shift trends and public opinion in more or less the same way in both fields). Magazines often blur the line between commerce and editorial content to get more money; the next step may be blurring the line between marketing, fashion and politics. That's awfully sad, but if that's the only way to attract more attention on social media, fight racism, fascism and narrow-mindedness, well, we may as well go for this option.
Desirable Cities of the Future (as Imagined in 1953)
In yesterday's post we looked at a structure that in 1967 was considered as extremely modern and innovatively futuristic, but was based on a system that revealed itself as being a failure as the years passed.
Design and architecturally-wise it is interesting to go back in time and explore utopian projects for the future planned 50 or 60 years ago. In 1953 Italian magazine Settimana Incom started for example publishing a series of colourful illustrations by Louis Bulgarini that tried to depict the city of the future.
Called "Megistopoli" the city was supposed to develop vertically on a circular map, with a massive central skyscraper with a body formed by high-rises and a series of lower skyscrapers surrrounding it. Schools, offices and entertainment places such as theatres and cinemas would be located in the lower floors, while hospitals in the higher levels. A ring of parks and gardens separated these main structures from a series of small villas and houses forming a sort of quiet suburban belt.
As for means of transport, the project suggested there would be no cars, but flying machines so there would be more elevated platforms located at different levels of the skyscrapers. At the moment there is a lot of talk about autonomous drones that can transport humans and cool flying taxis. Proper technologies for such machines are still being developed, but the utopian solutions suggested to us in sci-fi books and illustrations at times feel desirable and fun and keep on making us dream about a better future for our urban environments and our societies.
When Brutalism Becomes Brutal: The Rise and Fall of the Morandi Bridge, Genoa, Italy
Tragic news of a bridge collapse arrived this morning from Genoa, Italy: at least 20 were killed when an 80-metre section of the Polcevera Bridge on the A10 motorway came down during a storm. While the exact causes have still to be ascertained, the collapse is probably to be attributed to a system patented by engineer Riccardo Morandi.
Born in Rome in 1902, Morandi founded his own office when he was in his late twenties and started working closely with construction companies. Fascinated by the technology of concreting, he focused his career on concrete cable-stayed bridges.
The concrete stays of cable strayed bridges consist of pre-stressing tendons cast into a beam as thick concrete cover for corrosion protection. The stays are then post-tensioned so that they remain in compression.
The tie sections of Morandi's bridges were his trademark: though complicated, the ties behaved like a system made of tendons that worked in tension, and of a prestressed concrete case that worked instead in decompression under the traffic load.
Morandi taught bridge construction in Florence and in Rome between the late '50s and the early '70s. His name is linked with famous bridges in Maracaibo, Magliana, Polcevera, Wadi Kuf, Rio Magdalena and Carpineto, structures filed under the "brutalism" category that won him comparisons with works by Pier Luigi Nervi or Sergio Musmeci.
Built between 1960-64 and put in service in September 1967, the Polcevera bridge connected the A7 Genoa-Serravalle highway to the A10 Genoa-Ventimiglia highway, running over shopping centres, factories and homes.
It was a difficult construction that required long studies on proportions: three A-shaped frames characterised the main part of the bridge that featured supporting decks connected by suspended girders. The long decks were suspended to prestressed concrete ties at a distance of 10 metres from the ends of the girders. The Polcevera bridge was similar in its structure to the Maracaibo, Wadi Kuf and Rio Magdalena bridges. When it was finished the 90 metre high and 1km long Polcevera bridge was considered as a new and experimental design, but time wasn't kind on the system behind it.
Indeed, twenty-five years after it was opened (a relatively short span of time for a bridge) the system had to be serviced as the ties showed corrosion traces and there were minor damages around the tendons. Morandi's aide at the time of building Polcevera, Francesco Pisani, carried out the recovery program in the '90s and planned the repairing intervention phases. Each tie was flanked with a set of 12 modern cables so that the suspension action was transferred from the ties to the stays. The original design behaviour of the bridge was maintained avoiding changes in the deflection and flexural behaviour of the deck.
Prestressed concrete ties are not considered safe solutions in our modern days as the tie suspension action is entrusted to a limited number of elements, the structure is not so robust and the maintenance actions difficult. Nowadays bridges are therefore built with a great number of stays so that when one stays fauls the other suspension elements guarantee the maintenance operations to the cables and make the substitution operation easier.
In the case of the Polcevera bridge there was something else to consider: the structure went through a series of restructuring stages in recent years, but Italian engineer Antonio Brencich, Associate Professor in Concrete Structures at the Genoa University, already stated two years ago in an article on an engineering magazine that the precompression system patented by Morandi was a failure (also the Maracaibo bridge fell, but, in that case, it was hit by an oil tanker in 1964) and that the Polcevera bridge was in a critical condition due to corrosion. It was disappointing to discover that design-wise the system was not as reliable as it was supposed to be, but it was extremely sad to realise that a tragedy may have been avoided if the authorities had taken into consideration the opinion of an expert and if a few political parties (some of them leading the Italian government at the moment) hadn't considered the possibility of the bridge collapsing as an alarming but improbable silly story.
To ponder a bit more about the main theme of this post - brutalism that turns brutal - we're closing this piece with a special playlist inspired by brutalist architecture. Hopefully, it will make some of us stop and think about our cities and the way we interact with the urban environments surrounding us.
The Story of a Treasure, Dreamed: "Manina, The Lighhouse Keeper's Daughter" or "The Girl in the Bikini" by Willy Rozier (1952)
Mondays can be dreadful things especially if you're working while everybody else is on holiday, but a good way to face your boring routine is escaping to a faraway land, maybe by watching a film that makes you dream a bit.
Manina, La Fille Sans Voile (Manina, The Woman Without A Veil) - also known as Manina, The Lighhouse Keeper's Daughter or The Girl in the Bikini (1952) - is a good option.
Directed by Willy Rozier, the film stars Jean-François Calvé as Gérard Morère, Howard Vernon as Éric and Brigitte Bardot as Manina.
The story follows the vicissitudes of 25-year-old Parisian student Gérard who hears a lecture about a treasure lost at sea by Troilus after the Peloponnesian War.
He talks to his lecturer and realises that five years earlier he had vacationed near the island of Lavezzi, in Corsica, where he had found an amphora that was probably part of the lost treasure. On Lavezzi he had also met a sweet and kind girl, Manina, the young daughter of the lighthouse keeper.
Dreaming of finding more vases possibly full of gold coins, Gérard embarks in a new adventure with the help of friends and an innkeeper who agree to finance his journey.
In Tangiers the young man hires the boat of cigarette smuggler Éric and they head towards Corsica. Once they arrive in the Lavezzi area that separates Corsica from Sardinia, Gérard gets reacquainted with Manina, who's turned 18, and the two fall in love.
In the meantime, after several and unfruitful diving sessions, Gérard manages to locate the lost treasure, but a twist in the tale reveals to him that, quite often in life, real treasures are not made of gold.
As a whole the film is a light and sweet romance (with a drama at the very end...) and with some comedy touches like the bar fight scene with comical cops restoring the peace and quiet by knocking everybody out.
The best parts are the shots of the Mediterranean coast, the landscapes of Lavezzi with its lighthouse and the underwater and diving sequences that still look fascinating and convincing.
The Archipelago of Lavezzi includes a series of small granite islands and reefs in the Strait of Bonifacio and the two main islands are Cavallo, the only inhabited island in the archipelago, and Lavezzi, where there are also two memorial cemeteries, here the victims of the 1855 shipwreck of the French frigate Sémillante are buried. The cemetery can actually be seen in a few sequences of the film and represents a symbolical hint at the tragic end of the story.
Fashion-wise the film may not be too great as there aren't many costume changes, but Brigitte Bardot wears two bikinis, at times matched with a wide low waist skirt decorated with an old patterned traditional Provençal print paired with a plain shirt tied under her breasts. The ensemble, that leaves her midriff bare and allows her to undress quickly to dive in the sea, contrasts with the dark and more traditional attire of her mother who is seen only in the domestic environment and who wears a scarf even inside the house.
Bardot's bikinis were enough to cause a few scandals: the film was shot in 1952 and released in 1953 in France when the bikini was still considered as immodest, but the film was released in the USA in 1958 (it was possible to screen it in the States because it was a foreign film, otherwise the Hays Code prohibition of exposure of the midriff would have forbidden it...) and in the UK in 1959.
Bardot was 17 when she starred in the film and, while her part wasn't too intense (this was her first major role) and she played Manina in an innocently instinctive way, her father ended up sueing the film company for not respecting the contract he had signed that stated the company wouldn't have released indecent images of his daughter (he lost the case).
Manina could be considered as a prelude to Bardot's iconic career, but there's also a bonus if you're watching it more for its set and settings than for its story and characters – the vaguely lounge soundtrack with a score written by Jean Yatove, enough to make you believe you're on a rock in Lavezzi, sunbathing with the lighthouse safely watching your back. Should be just enough to make your Monday slightly more bearable.
Fashion, Religion and...Traditions
Readers know that Irenebrination developed its own fashion and religion discourse way before The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute jumped on the holy bandwagon with the exhibition "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and The Catholic Imagination".
Though grand, the exhibition commits a cultural faux pas since it includes precious vestments on loan from the Holy See, garments created by famous fashion designers (who based them on traditional designs, so they didn't really invent anything...) for statues and Haute Couture creations, in a nutshell, there seems to be a missing link with more humble pieces and designs, maybe more linked with traditions (even though there is a section dedicated to looks inspired by monastic life).
Religious vestments do take a less grand but equally intriguing twist when they are combined with local traditions: the episcopal mitre illustrating this post for example belonged to Monsignor Giovanni Tonucci who used it when he was Apostolic Nuncio in Nairobi, Kenya, in the '90s (the mitre is dated 1996). After he went back to Italy and became archbishop of Loreto, he donated the mitre to the Museum of Malacology in Cupra Marittima.
The mitre, in plain white cotton, is an example of liturgical headgear decorated with local techniques and materials: cowry shells of the Monetaria moneta species also known as "money cowry" since this shell was historically used as a medium of exchange in many Pacific and Indian Ocean countries, were applied on the front and on the back. The decorative motifs are formed by rows of three shells (a symbolical number hinting at the Trinity), and by other motifs made employing 5 shells forming a cross. Yellow pearls from the Pinctada margaritifera, or black-lip pearl oyster, a saltwater clam, were also employed to create ray-like elements, symbolically embroidered from the centre of the mitre. As a whole the design is extremely simple and obviously very different from the richest headgear employed in liturgical ceremonies, yet it is a perfect example of how local traditions and materials can be employed to create a unique piece endowed with religious symbolism and spiritual meaning.


Become a Learning 3.0 Facilitator and be part of the revolution behind knowledge creation among workers, teams, organizations and society.
Learning Camps are events for facilitators or "wannabe" facilitators where you have the opportunity to see Learning 3.0 principles in practice and apply them to your own, unique facilitation style. By firstly improving your facilitation skills at camp, you will be licensed as a L3F (Learning 3.0 Facilitator) and all set to organise your own official Learning 3.0 events.
If you are someone who wants to rethink the way you and others learn, then the Learning Camp is for you.
Hierarchies can greatly inhibit emergent learning. It's more effective when people talk to each other as equals rather than as disparate members of a hierarchy.
Great ideas can emerge in both formal and informal settings. At Learning Camp, we understand that and that is why we promote real confraternisation, offering both kinds of experience to our campers.
Want a learning camp in a city near you?
The cities that get the most signups will be added to the 2016 schedule. Vote now!
Get inspired by meeting creative workers who want to revolutionise learning experiences.
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Hiking, improvisation, music, games, pizza night, drinks... lots of fun!
Over the weekend, we watched everyone move from training to sharing - as a learning process.
In the Learning Camp you discover that you're capable of letting your teams shine, just by being a learning facilitator.
Learning Camps liberate minds. By knowing more about emergent learning and how to act as a learning facilitator, I'm not looking for the right answers anymore. Instead, I promote sharing (keep this in mind!) and improve our learning initiatives at SERPRO.
Even though I'm already a fan and practitioner of emergent learning, the Learning Camp let me rethink and rebuild a lot of concepts and practices. I lead training events almost every week but I can honestly say that my performance in the classroom can be classified as BLC (Before-Learning Camp) and ALC (After-Learning Camp).
For a long time, I was considering a shift in my career. The Learning Camp really gave me an inspiring reason to do that.


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Chancellor talks but doesn't deliver: RCN launches pay petition in response
You are here: Royal College of Nursing / News and Events / News / Chancellor talks but doesn't deliver: RCN launches pay petition in response
Spending review is missed opportunity to give NHS nursing staff early and significant pay rise as RCN opposes pay freeze for other public sector workers.
The RCN has today (25 November) launched a petition to demand fair pay for nursing after the chancellor addressed, but failed to deliver, a pay rise for nursing staff in his spending review.
Responding to the "missed opportunity" to recognise and reward the expertise and dedication of nursing staff today, RCN Chief Executive & General Secretary Dame Donna Kinnair said:
"The level of pay rise that the government agrees must reflect the true skills and value of nursing. For now, nursing staff continue to be worse off than 10 years ago.
"At a time when many experienced nurses are burnt out, exhausted and considering leaving the career they love, the link between unfair pay, staffing levels and safety becomes even more stark."
The petition comes just days after public polling, carried out by YouGov for the RCN, showed that 82% of those surveyed said they supported a pay rise for nursing staff this year.
While the RCN is campaigning for a fully funded 12.5% pay increase for all nursing staff covered by Agenda for Change terms, it also wants to see an equivalent pay rise for those working outside the NHS. On plans for a pay freeze for public sector workers, excluding NHS staff, Dame Donna said:
"Nursing staff across the board will oppose plans to freeze the pay of equally skilled professionals. Those working in social care and the community deserve a pay boost as much as their NHS colleagues.
"The chancellor was one of millions on doorsteps to clap carers this year. Unlike others, he had the power to turn warm words into deeds – but today, he has failed to act."
The RCN also argues that a public sector pay freeze doesn't make economic sense. Dr Gavan Conlon, a labour market economist at London Economics, said: "Imposing a pay freeze on public sector workers appears like a sensible policy from the government in response to its current financial challenges. However, in reality it is poor economics.
"Essentially cutting salaries in real terms will result in less disposable income circulating throughout the economy, and the firms that are relying on a return to normality at the end of the pandemic will see consumers unable to make the purchases required to support businesses in the longer term. Public sector pay freezes will further destabilise the businesses the government is attempting to prioritise."
While the RCN welcomes the announcement of investment in the NHS and social care it warns the money will only truly benefit patients if there are enough nursing staff to treat them.
<<Add your name to our petition now>>
More information about our Fair Pay For Nursing campaign
Public support for pay rise 'overwhelming', says RCN
Every MP across the UK receives message asking them to support Fair Pay for Nursing


South Bay Customs is so much more than a custom motorcycle shop; it's also an eclectic event venue providing space for everything from birthday celebrations and weddings to family reunions and team-building events. The unique venue is filled with Americana-inspired decor, including vintage rock memorabilia, motorcycles and quirky old photographs. In addition to the indoor space that includes a stage and large bar, South Bay Customs also offers a spacious outdoor area complete with comfortable seating, lighting and space to dance.


BEIRUT (AP) — China's Foreign Minister is calling for a political solution to end Syria's six-year crisis saying that once the country's security conditions begin to improve refugees will start returning to their country.
Foreign Minister Wang Yi made his comments in Beirut during a news conference Friday with his Lebanese counterpart Gibran Bassil.
Some 1.5 million Syrian refugees who fled their country's conflict are believed to be living in Lebanon, equal to about a third of the Mediterranean country's population of 4.5 million people.
Bassil described the presence of refugees as an "existential threat" to Lebanon calling for a swift return of refugees to their country.
Wang said that China has given Beirut aid in the past "and we will continue to give such assistance to Lebanon in accordance with Lebanon's needs."


This sign is perfect for cafés and in-store advertisements. It can easily be changed as specials start up and menus change. In a larger store it can be used to advertise products and classes that may be available. The light weight construction makes this frame quite portable and it can be easily moved to where its message will have the most impact.
Overall, easy to use website but I did need to online chat a couple times to get it all figured out.


If there's one nutritional product you should be taking, it is Pure Health, as it provides a superior nutirtional support for anyone over 50.
Over the last 4 years the Scientists at Nature's Range, a company we've worked closely with over the years; have been developing the ultimate health product for anyone over 50, and with "Pure Health", they've certainly achieved their goal.
Pure Health contains the highest grade and concentrations of the three different types of Collagen, Kurinol which is a great asset in helping the immune system, EPICOR (one of the key ingredients of our ProstImmune and ArthImmune products), which also helps the immune system, Ashwagandha which helps in a number of key areas, and Opextan a very powerful anti-oxidant.
In addition to these ingredients, Pure Health also contains Coenzyme Q10, Hyaluronic Acid and a very powerful blend of anti-oxidants, vitamins and minerals, such as Zinc; which are essential for maintaining good health.
All together the total benefits of all of these powerful ingredients will give the strongest support for anyone who is over 50, and that is why we're so excited about having been chosen by Nature's Range to be able to market Pure Health.


Disposable soft foam SpO2 sensor intended for continuous oxygen saturation and pulse rate monitoring.
Nellcor Compatible (part number DP100N/A-090103S). Please note this version is ONLY compatible with Nellcor standard oximetry and NOT Nellcor OxiMax oximetry.
Fits adult finger and neonate foot.
Soft foam neonate to adult sensor with "one-size-fits-all" velcro attachment allowing easy attachment, repositioning and removal.
If you are unsure which version you require or your device is not mentioned above, please CONTACT US.


text:
Q: Google App Script - Visualize the survey using Google Spreadsheet I used survey to collect data about people opinion. The question is answered using a check-box (Yes/No)
I would like to visualize the results using charts. How can I do that using one column. all the examples that I have seen are related to do graphs between two columns.
For example:
col A
 No
 Yes
 Yes

Pie chart : 66% YES - 33% NO
I am using this script, but when I run it nothing happend
function updateGraph() {
  var sheet = SpreadsheetApp.getActiveSheet()
  var charts = sheet.getCharts();
  if (charts.length < 1) {
     return;
  }
  var chart = charts[0]; // We operate only on the first graph in this example
  var ranges = chart.getRanges();
  var range = ranges[0]; // ... and we expect it to have only one range
  var dataRange = sheet.getDataRange();
  var numRows = dataRange.getNumRows(); // Find the actual number of rows in the sheet
  var rangeA1Notation = "B1:B"+numRows;
  chart = chart.modify().removeRange(range).setOption("title", "Chart over " + rangeA1Notation).addRange(sheet.getRange(rangeA1Notation)).build();
  sheet.updateChart(chart)

}

Any idea how to solve this ?

A: You can use a function in your spreadsheet like:
=COUNTIF(A:A,"Yes")

and the pending
=COUNTIF(A:A,"No")

so you can build the table directly in the spreadsheet:

a demo here

A: I would suggest finding out how many 'YES's and 'NO's you have first:
var numYes = 0;
var numNo = 0;
var rangeYesNo = sheet.getRange(range).getValues();
for (i=0; i<rangeYesNo.length; ++i) {
  if (rangeYesNo[i].indexOf('yes') > -1){
    numYes++;}
  if(rangeYesNo[i].indexOf('no') > -1){
    numNo++;}
    }
}

and unless you want to try working with building the data structure for the table... (see: https://developers.google.com/chart/interactive/docs/reference#DataTable)
it might be easier to assign the values to a spot on the spreadsheet and build a table off of that 2x2 segment:
sheet.getRange('F1').setValue('Yes');
sheet.getRange('F2').setValue('No');
sheet.getRange('G1').setValue(numYes);
sheet.getRange('G2').setValue(numNo);
var rangeA1Notation = sheet.getRange('F1:G2');

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Olivia Nuzzi's Latest Trump Exclusive Is Super Weird and Way Too Long
Jack Crosbie
Paraphrasing, in my opinion, is a great thing to do when you get an interview with a source who's saying a lot of words that aren't super important. New York writer Olivia Nuzzi, who has spent the past year cultivating sources and relationships in the Trump administration, published a very strange story today about getting personally called into the Oval Office by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, where she then met with Trump, VP Mike Pence, Sec. State Mike Pompeo, and Chief of Staff John Kelly in an extremely strange, rambling interview that incorporated about 90% of Trump's normal stump speech, all transcribed and quoted in full.
My Private Oval Office Press Conference With Trump, Pence, Pompeo, and Kelly
The president really wanted to convince me that he isn't going to fire his chief of staff, John…
The situation arose, Nuzzi writes, because Trump got wind that she was planning to write a story about him wanting to fire Chief of Staff John Kelly. The news in this is that Trump says he doesn't want to fire Chief of Staff John Kelly. That's really about it — although it's definitely super weird that Trump needed to tell her that personally, and call in Pence, Pompeo and Kelly to say essentially the same thing.
Here's some relevant quotes, per New York:
"But I want to tell you a couple of things: the chief is doing a very good job. I'm very happy with him, we have a very good relationship, number one. Number two, I didn't offer anybody else the job. I didn't talk to anybody about the job. And I'm not, I'm not looking.
Ok, Trump says he's not looking for a new Chief of Staff. At one point, Trump calls in Nick Ayers, Pence's CoS. Nuzzi writes that she'd heard Trump had offered Ayers Kelly's job.
"He has a good relationship with the general. I didn't offer Nick the job. I mean, I'm telling you in front. Now, you can write that I did. But now, you have him, you have me, and I didn't offer him a job and he didn't accept a job. And there was no offer!"
In between and before and after this, however, there is like, a solid thousand words of Trump just... talking. He goes into the Mueller investigation (takeaway: "no collusion"), he literally hands Nuzzi a printout of 58 bullet points titled "TRUMP ADMINISTRATION ACCOMPLISHMENTS," and then talks about them for a long time.
What I'm saying is just like, it would have been fine to paraphrase a lot of this! The printout thing is super weird, and definitely should be in there, and the general circumstance of the story is extremely strange. It's super weird that Trump called her in (he had a lunch meeting with Pence scheduled), and then Kelly, Pompeo, Ayers, and several other people just popped their heads in or showed up. But the only actual newsworthy thing here is that Trump denies that he's going to fire Kelly. There's a ton in here that is just giving Trump another forum to fire off his stump speech and favorite talking points. We've heard these! We don't need to hear these again!
To her credit, Nuzzi doesn't list all of this stuff without challenging it (there are occasional points of clarification or fact checks in there, but not a lot). It's not as egregious as USA Today deciding to publish a completely unchallenged, almost categorically false op-ed under Trump's byline. But it also doesn't really serve anyone to quote him on stuff like whether or not he misses New York City (he does, and also he used to live near the New York offices, but he likes D.C. because of the Accomplishments).
Contributing Writer, Splinter


text:
Olga Ahtinen (born 15 August 1997) is a Finnish footballer who plays as a midfielder and has appeared for the Finland women's national team.

Career
Ahtinen was capped by the Finland national team in 2017, and she appeared for the team during the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup qualifying cycle. She played for Finland at the UEFA Women's Euro 2022 and was approaching 50 international appearances. Domestically, she played for GBK Kokkola, before joining Swedish side Linköpings FC.

International goals

References

External links

1997 births
Living people
Finnish women's footballers
Finland women's international footballers
Women's association football midfielders
Damallsvenskan players
IF Limhamn Bunkeflo players
Brøndby IF (women) players
Kokkola Futis 10 players
Pallokissat players
Expatriate women's footballers in Denmark
Expatriate women's footballers in Sweden
Finnish expatriate footballers
Finnish expatriate sportspeople in Denmark
Finnish expatriate sportspeople in Sweden
People from Kokkola
Sportspeople from Central Ostrobothnia
UEFA Women's Euro 2022 players


The UK web site for Precision Air is operated by Destination Store Limited, a UK-registered company, holding a UK Air Traffic Organisers Licence (6375) and which is a retail branch of APG UK, an airline representation company which exclusively represents Precision Air in the UK.
Precision Air is a public listed Tanzanian airline, which is a leader in providing scheduled flight services to over 17 destinations within and outside Tanzania from its main hub Dar es Salaam. The company operates on the principle that quick, comfortable and reliable service is the best way to serve its customers. Through its customer-focused approach, many have become part of the Precision Air family.
Tanzania, situated on the eastern part of the continent of Africa just south of the equator, is a vast country endowed with varied natural splendor. Precision Air started with its headquarters in Arusha - the midpoint between the Cape and Cairo, which is the entry point to many of Tanzania's world-renowned landmarks and national parks. The headquarters of Precision Air are now Dar es Salaam, the business complex of the country, which is home to a vast size of traffic travelling within and outside Tanzania.
Precision Air has a reputable on-time performance on scheduled flights. We are serious when we recite our motto, Quick, Comfortable and Reliable. After all, Precision is part of our name.
Our Mission - "To Develop And Provide Superior Air Transport Services That Exceeds Customer Expectations."
Our Vision - "To Be The Airline Of Choice."


2018's color of the year, "Ultra Violet" is out, and "Living Coral" is in.
Pantone, the official color institute, recently announced that coral is 2019's new color of the year.
"Living Coral embraces us with warmth and nourishment to provide comfort and buoyancy in our continually shifting environment," said Pantone.
The vibrant orange shade now will be seen more often in the fashion industry, entertainment industry, popular travel destinations, etc. For the fashion industry, this will be a change because coral usually isn't seen to often on the red carpet. Also, it's not a shade commonly worn by teens, so styling the new shade might be difficult for some.
Since the shade is a "vibrant, yet mellow" according to Pantone, the color can be worn as the statement piece of the outfit. Whether it's through a hand bag, earrings, shoes, necklaces, etc, the color is bright enough to make an outfit pop.
"I think nail polish would be a pretty way to add coral to an outfit, especially in the spring and summer months," said sophomore Maivy Dang.
The coral in the look doesn't have to be from an outfit, it can be in the makeup instead. "we suggest taking a cue from model, Gigi Hadid. Play around with some peach-colored eyeshadows…" said People magazine. Gigi Hadid has incorporated coral into many of her red carpet makeup looks not only with eyeshadow, but also with coral shades of lipsticks.
Brands like Too Faced, Loreal, Urban Decay, and Mac all sell products that could incorporate coral into a makeup look.
Gigi Hadid also was also was one of the first people to style 2019's color of the year. The day after the announcement Hadid was seen on the New York streets wearing a full coral outfit. She wore the color in a full pant suit, and in her high heels. Obviously, this isn't a usual look to wear for a normal teen, but Hadid showed that coral can be worn in a fashionable way even in the winter.
Coral may not be the most popular color, but celebrities have inspired people on how to wear the shade. The color definitely will make an entrance this year as Pantone's 2019 color of the year.


Each year, thousands of students interested in a career in finance take the Bloomberg Aptitude Test (BAT), which measures individuals' strengths and weaknesses as related to a career in finance. Employers such as investment banks, hedge funds, and asset management firms use the BAT to find graduates that are a good fit for their positions.
In 2013, two IE students scored exceptionally well on the BAT. In March, Alex Beloshevsky scored a 700, which earned him a second place ranking in Europe, Middle East and Africa. In November, Ola Kvalheim scored in the Top 5 in Europe, Middle East and Africa. After graduating from IE in December, Alex started a job as a financial analyst at a leading Israeli software company. We caught up with him to learn more about his career, his experience at IE, and his plans for the future.
IE: How did you start your career in finance?
Alex: I started my career in finance by studying economics and business management at Ben-Gurion University in Israel. This track is the most finance oriented of all possible tracks at BGU and I felt that it would be a great fit for me. After graduating with honors I started working for one of the two leading credit ranking agencies in Israel and tried to learn as much as possible on the job. Just one example from the top of my mind is that the diamond industry is notoriously secretive; what I did in order to get around this problem and to be able to produce more value-added credit reports on participants of this industry was to learn the historic reasons why this industry is so secretive and to learn the lingo used in the industry. This way I was able to provide more insightful reports than other economists in this field. The secret (at least for me) was to question why things are done one way and not another, and to leverage these lessons and to try to become a better professional.
IE: What attributes are most important for success in this field?
Alex: In my opinion, the most important attributes are curiosity, an analytic mindset, and a healthy dose of skepticism. I believe that anyone can cover an experience gap if they want to by reading the economic and financial literature and newspapers. However, if you just read the material without thinking what it means, analyzing the meaning of what you have read, and without trying to figure out why someone is saying something and not something else, you will not be able to provide the deep and thoughtful insights that are expected from a financial expert, either in a corporate setting or at a financial institution.
IE: What was your favorite part of IE's IMBA program?
Alex: My favorite part of the IMBA was getting exposed to my classmates who had different experiences and cultures. I found their insights fascinating, especially when they were speaking outside of the scope of their experience. For example, listening to an engineer from a totally different geography speaking during a marketing or corporate finance class is an enlightening experience. You can see how different we are because of our occupational experience and culture, which forces you to look at what you think is right and try to reevaluate if you still think it's true after hearing what others think.
IE: What is your dream job for the future?
Alex: My dream job is a financial management role in one of Israel's largest corporations. Seeing as Israel's main export is software, I have started my transition by joining a leading Israeli online marketing firm in an analyst position.
IE: What trends do you think will be most important in finance in coming years?
Alex: It is my firm belief that automation will become more and more widespread in the coming years and that it will take away most or at least a large portion away from the dirty work that financial professionals face now, especially at the entry level. Therefore, I believe that in order to be able to compete and to stand out, the financial professional of the coming years will need to be able to synthesize larger pieces of information that computers will provide for him and to provide meaningful insights.
"The more you know, the more you don't know" – IMBA Alumnus Raymond Fung and his IE ExperienceIMBA Alumna Gwendoline de Ganay launches Start-Up in Brazil!!


text:
Netflix's New Brand
After flattening the logo, Netflix has adopted a universal branding language that can scale from giant billboards to tiny iPhone apps.
By Mark Wilson 3 minute Read
When Netflix's internal design team quietly unveiled a new, flat logo last year, at least one critic made a stink. What was Netflix if not a shout of extrusions and redness?
Now, we know.
The creative studio Gretel has published the fruits of a year-long collaboration with Netflix, building the company a whole new brand identity capable of operating on a global scale.
"The big challenge was unifying everything. They're really successful, obviously, but the brand itself was a little fractured because they were working with partners and agencies around the word," explains Gretel Creative Director Ryan Moore. "They had the logo and some basic text guidelines, but due to the sheer growth, they couldn't oversee digital, print, trailers, and social media. What they needed was an idea to stitch everything together–a conceptual approach–but certainly a visual system all these agencies could look at and adapt to any format they needed to."
Any random graphic designer who lands a Netflix job needs to be able to easily create on-brand visuals, and so what the Gretel team developed was a simple, flexible card system called "the Stack." In any brand manifestation of Netflix, there are three core cards that you'll see: The first is a photograph or video of a "character" (like Kevin Spacey's Frank Underwood), the second is a splash of color (generally white or red), and the third is text of some sort (like a movie title or tagline). In aggregate, the three stacks become the Netflix brand.
It works. Not only is the stack equally recognizable at various scales and mediums–whether it appears on a banner ad or the side of a building, or whether it happens to be still or in motion–the stack has another useful feature. Its three layers don't need to exist as equals. Their intensity is tweakable depending on an ad's context.
"We called it brand volume. [The brand] could be turned up or down," Moore says. Because in some contexts, the characters themselves might actually speak fine for the entire Netflix brand, while in others, all of Netflix's original content might be unrecognizable. "For a billboard of Orange Is the New Black in the U.S., it might need a subtle hint of Netflix branding. But if it's launching in Germany, you might need more volume to stamp wit with Netflix look and feel."
However, the longer you look at the stack in motion, the more it feels like it was built, not just for ad-based branding, but to function as user interface on iPhones and Xboxes. Its cards–that are treated with real weight and shadow–have hints of Google's recent approach to UX at the core.
That feel is by design, as Gretel built the language to scale into Netflix's interactive products, too. "I know the lack of UI is a trend. You're seeing it on the Xbox–gestures and voice command–and my iPhone can ask Siri anything. Part of our design challenge wasn't about stripping away the UI experience, but enhancing something about Netflix's core position as a service, as service that can rally accurately guess what I might like and serve up content from a seemingly endless catalog."
In this regard, Gretel doesn't make any firm distinction between branding a company and branding a company's product or even UX. It's all a continuum.
"This is something we talk about a lot internally, the idea of behavior," says Gretel Executive Creative Director Greg Hahn. "Really it translates across all parts of branding: Language behavior. Type behavior. Motion behavior. We're trying to create things that can speak and have signature behaviors across any medium."
"The hope is that [Netflix] will begin trickling this into the UI at some point, but we don't know at this point to what extent," he adds later. "It's a much longer lead time for UI implementation than for the rest of marketing."
[via Brand New]
Mark Wilson is a senior writer at Fast Company who has written about design, technology, and culture for almost 15 years. His work has appeared at Gizmodo, Kotaku, PopMech, PopSci, Esquire, American Photo and Lucky Peach