text:
Tag Archives: Yes Scotland campaign
13/09/2014 · 10:44 am
No, Scotland isn't in a currency union
A currency union is when two states use the same currency.
The UK is a single state, that uses a single currency: the pound sterling.
James Meadway, who describes himself on his twitter profile as "Senior economist at The New Economics", asserted on Twitter:
"You're already *in* a currency union. Who in Scotland elects the Bank of England?"
Filed under Economics, Politics, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Bank of England, Better Together campaign, currency union, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Guernsey, Isle of Man, James Meadway, Jersey, New Economic Foundation, Scottish Green Party, SNP, Yes Scotland campaign
Cybernats, Cybernaws, Clare Lally
Last night on Twitter the front cover of the Daily Telegraph was causing a great deal of uninformed stushie.
Clare Lally is a notable campaigner and a full-time carer: she has two daughters, one with severe disabilities, for whom she is the primary carer with her husband Derek. In 2010, she was voted Tesco Living's "Mum of the Year" in 2010. She was interviewed by the BBC 2011 electoral campaign as part of the launch of Manifesto for Carers: she's also a Carers Champion.
Filed under Internet, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Better Together campaign, Campbell Gunn, Carers Champion, Clare Lally, Dunbarton, independence referendum, Jackie Baillie, Mum of the Year, Scottish independence, Stuart Campbell, Wings Over Scotland, Yes Scotland campaign
The #indyref campaign begins today
In less than four months, we'll go to the polls to vote Yes or No to the question:
"Should Scotland be an independent country?"
And today, the campaign period for the referendum officially begins.
But as I pointed out a few weeks ago (and Simon Jenkins pointed out yesterday) the SNP are not offering independence: they want major decisions for Scotland's governance to be made at Westminster/in London. (It's all in the White Paper: haven't you read it?)
Filed under Economics, Elections, European politics, Indyref White Paper, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Better Together campaign, Conservative Party, Conservatives, currency union, David Coburn, devomax, Diane Abbott, European Parliament, General Election 2015, Ian Smart, independence referendum, Labour, Labour Party, LibDems, Liberal Democrats, Mark Lazarowicz, Nigel Farage, Patrick Harvie, Scottish Green Party, Scottish Greens, SNP, UKIP, White Paper for Independence, Yes Scotland campaign
Cameron in Aberdeen
David Cameron is bringing his Cabinet north to Aberdeen today "to highlight the importance to Scotland's oil industry of staying in the UK."
Presumably you have to be Scottish to understand why this is such a ludicrously bad idea. Or at least, not an English Conservative who was 25 and working for the Conservative Research Department in London in 1992.
In the 1992 general election, the Conservative Party won 5 seats in Scotland.
It's been 22 years and that victory remains the highlight of their electoral achievements in the past quarter-century. (Yes, they do have 14 MSPs in the Scottish Parliament, but most of them are "list" MSPs – they represent a region, not a constituency.)
The most effective thing David Cameron could do to win a No vote for independence in Scotland is to stay in England and repeat some variation on "Of course the Scots have a right to hold a referendum on independence: naturally I want Scotland to remain part of the UK but we will respect the democratic will of the Scottish people whatever happens."
I actually respected Cameron's decision not to debate Alex Salmond; I assumed his advisors had let him know it would have done neither Cameron or the Better Together campaign any good in Scotland, however well the English Tory Prime Minister comes across in his own electoral territory.
The notion that a Conservative Prime Minister visiting Aberdeen to tell the Scottish people that we'd never be able to cope with our own oil industry if we were independent so we'd much better stay part of the UK…
Filed under Oil, Scottish Culture, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Aberdeen, Alex Salmond, David Cameron, how did our oil get under their sand?, independence referendum, oil industry, we'd rather bleed out of our eyeballs than vote Tory, why don't the Scots vote Tory?, Yes Scotland campaign
Offshore politics
When the SNP transited smoothly from "we'll use to the Euro" to "we'll use the pound" that was a campaign tactic.
When the Tories, LibDems, and Labour all bounced to their feet and said ha ha, we won't let you use the pound, that was a campaign tactic.
I do not believe either the Yes Scotland or the Better Together campaigns have really thought this through: or at least, they are certainly not making a fact-based argument based on having thought this through.
Ian Bell writes in the Herald:
"Hardball" is the macho cliche being applied to the Chancellor's fiat towards a currency union. Despite its protestations, Mr Darling's team pursues the kind of negative campaigning that never goes out of style in Westminster. No compunction is involved. The referendum must be won at all costs. But what might that cost be, exactly, if the prize is a united kingdom in the aftermath?
Filed under Currency, Economics, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Alex Salmond, Bank of Scotland, Better Together campaign, Clydesdale Bank, Daniel Donaldson, eurozone, Frances Coppola, George Osborne, James Leigh-Pemberton, Kirstin Baker, Lucinda Riches, Michael Kirkwood, Peter Gibbs, Philip Remnant, Royal Bank of Scotland, sterlingzone, TSB Bank, UKFI, Vickers, Yes Scotland campaign
Arguing the wrong debate
The currency debate is a pure waste of time.
The SNP's line if Scotland votes Yes has for several years been that Scotland will continue to use rUK's pound. This is a good campaign strategy as far as it goes, since it means people don't have to think about the logistics of setting up a Mint in Scotland to produce our own coins and a national supply of banknotes: it means people don't have to think about changing currencies if they go to England/Wales post-independence: it means people don't have to think about monetary change as a symbol of the huge changes of independence.
So, good campaign strategy, but it's a completely rubbish way of deciding on a currency for Scotland post-independence.
To counter this SNP campaign strategy, the UK government/Better Together campaign have announced they will not "permit" Scotland to make use of the pound post-independence, and to counter that… but never mind. The whole thing gets indescribably messy, with both sides grandstanding more and more, and the whole thing is an utter waste of time.
Filed under Economics, Poverty, Tax Avoidance
Tagged as austerity is a mutual suicide pact, banknotes, Better Together campaign, currency union, euro, George Osborne, Mary Slessor, Scottish banknotes, Scottish independence referendum, SNP, Yes Scotland campaign
Words are worthless
I have a talent for putting words together effectively and clearly. This talent has been honed by many years of work. I enjoy doing it. And I'm fortunate enough that I have for many years been able to earn my living by doing it, though almost invariably when I'm paid to write my name did not go on my writing – it belongs to my employer: it's been a rule of thumb for most of my working life that I can either get credited or get money, rarely both.
I regard this as unfortunate, not as a moral value. I like getting paid for doing work, and I like getting the credit for doing good work. I have argued in this blog multiple times for multiple reasons that people have a right to get paid. It doesn't matter how much you enjoy your work, or how good you are at it: if someone else intends to profit from your work, you have a right to get paid for it.
Article 23.3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.
Filed under Human Rights, In The Media, Poverty, Scottish Politics
Tagged as A day's work for a day's pay, Better Together campaign, Elliot Bulmer, Scottish Constitiution, Scottish independence referendum, The Herald, undecided Scot, writing is work, Yes Scotland campaign
A just Scotland: the vision
What is the best way to achieve social justice in Scotland?
As I sat in the basement studio of the Augustine United Church – we were in the middle of the workshop on Fair taxation and a strong economy – I heard the March for Independence go by.
One of the things I found myself saying more than once yesterday at A Just Scotland was that each side in the independence debate manages to convince me of the rightness of the other side.
Except, actually, during the debate that ended the day, between Kezia Dugdale and Ewan Hunter, who were meant to be arguing for Better Together and for Yes Scotland respectively, but in the end settled down to the usual Labour / SNP slanging match with more sensible contributions from the audience than from the debaters. What both Dugdale and Hunter convinced me is that I want to go a different direction from either of them.
Filed under Scottish Culture, Scottish Politics
Tagged as A Just Scotland, Better Together campaign, Ewan Hunter, Gerry Hassan, independence referendum, Kezia Dugdale, local government, STUC, Yes Scotland campaign
The March for Independence
The speculation about numbers for tomorrow's march is quite amusing, because both sides seem to be refusing to give a number.
Jeff Duncan told the Evening News:
"This is the first of three marches. We'll be holding another one on almost exactly the same day next year and we're hoping to quadruple the numbers we get tomorrow. Then in September 2014 we'll be holding what we expect to be the largest march."
He added: "We know there are going to be thousands coming along based on the number of seats we have sold on the coaches, but there are also those organising their own transport. Plus we imagine plenty of people already living in Edinburgh will attend, so we can't really put a definite number how many will actually be marching. Only Saturday will reveal that."
This is the March for Scottish Independence. (Jokes about Frodo and Bilbo Baggins – tomorrow is Hobbit Day – regretfully omitted.)
This is the first march of its kind: there is really no clue how many people will think they should or feel they can. It takes a certain degree of enthusiasm, even for a cause you support, to go on a march: the usual rule-of-thumb reckoning is that for every one person who goes on the march, there's probably 10 at home who support. This is why the two million people who marched against the Iraq war all across the UK (over a hundred thousand in Glasgow) were such a warning that Labour should have heeded in February 2003.
The organisers will have been asked by the police to give some idea of how many will show up, but they're not obliged to disclose that estimate to anyone else. "Yes in 2014" gets about 30%-40% in opinion polls, but no one knows how many that will represent in actual willing-to-show-up-on-Saturday-morning-and-march numbers (gay marriage gets about 65%, but rallies in support of marriage get about 200 people).
Partly it depends how beleaguered supporters of a cause feel – how important they feel it is to get out there and tell the world. In so many ways, the Yes Scotland campaign's habit of talking only to itself is against them there: many Yes Scotland supporters don't seem to talk much with anyone who doesn't already agree with them, allowing themselves the impression of wide support, suggesting a march is unnecessary.
The National Collective of artists and creatives for Scottish independence has a
Guide to Marching – a simple selection of 12 basic suggestions that can help make our march a symbol of a modern, progressive and creative movement that wants to imagine a better nation.
I'll bet more Scots went to London to march for fox hunting than @thesnp get at their "massive" march for Indy this weekend
— Iain McGill (@IainMcGill) September 20, 2012
(There have been several Countryside Alliance marches in London, and as I confirmed, Iain McGill has no idea how many Scots showed up to any of them.)
Obviously, the Yes Scotland campaign hope that they will at least get enough people that the rally in Princes Street gardens at the end won't look too silly in overhead visuals. Choosing the Meadows for a starting point also suggests a certain confidence in numbers (and funding – you don't get to use the Meadows for free).
Filed under of Edinburgh, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Better Together campaign, Make Poverty History, Scottish Constitutional Convention, Scottish independence, STUC, Yes Scotland campaign
Yes, we would still be in the EU
There are many sensible arguments to be made for and against Scottish independence.
It is depressing that so much time has been spent on a non-argument: Scottish membership in the European Union.
If Scotland were to become independent, the rUK would still be a EU nation, and Scotland would have to apply for EU membership, UN recognition, and would have to ratify the various international charters, treaties, and laws. None of this would be automatic, but none of this would be difficult to accomplish.
From the conclusions of the Presidency, Copenhagen 21-22 June 1993 – the Copenhagen criteria:
The European Council today agreed that the associated countries in Central and Eastern Europe that so desire shall become members of the European Union. Accession will take place as soon as an associated country is able to assume the obligations of membership by satisfying the economic and political conditions required.
Filed under Elections, European politics, Politics, Scottish Politics
Tagged as Better Together campaign, EU membership, European Parliament, independence referendum, Scottish independence, Yes Scotland campaign


text:
geoff-cutmore
Geoff Cutmore
By Manish Khanal
Birth Date December 23
Full Name Geoff Cutmore
Birth Name Geoff Cutmore
Profession Presenter
Sexual Orientation striaight
Horoscope Capricorn
Networth 2000000
One of the most experienced financial journalists, Geoff Cutmore works as a co-anchor for CNBC's Europe flagship show, "Squawk Box." He provides latest business news, instant market analysis and themes. Despite being known for his financial knowledge, Geoff is said to be a private person regarding his personal life.
Geoff Cutmore was born on December 23 but his exact birth-year is not known. He might be in his early 60s. Geoff has an expertise on reporting the depth of financial markets. For CNBC, he has anchored from both Europe and Asia.
Geoff Cutmore Marital Status
Media personal are the ones who dig out the information about other people. And like most of the media people, Cutmore has been successful in keeping his own life away from the present media. It seems like Geoff is married, but the exact information is not available to the common people. He hasn't mentioned about his wife and kids, hence it is difficult to know his relationship status.
Image: The CNBC presenter, Geoff Cutmore in his show
Source: Flickr
As we can see, Geoff has very much interest in business going in the world. He does not like to remain as the center news of media with his personal life. So, he stays busy with his job, interviewing various high-profile personals around the world.
Net Worth and Salary of Geoff Cutmore
Geoff Cutmore has an estimated net worth of $2 Million. He has accumulated much of his net worth through his successful career of working in the Television and various business ventures. Aditi Roy is another CNBC journalist with a net worth of $1 Million.
Image: Geoff Cutmore hosting his show in CNBC
The average salary of a CNBC Presenter is $683,151. As Geoff has worked in the field for more than two decades, He has been earning much more than the average salary.
Two decades with CNBC
Geoff Cutmore started his career with Squawk Box Europe and worked alongside Louisa Bojesen. After gaining some experience, He shifted to CNBC. At there, he worked as Europe's breakfast news program.
He is also a relief presenter of Asia Square Box on CNBC Asia. He has been working as a presenter along with Jim Cramer and David Faber.
Check Out More Diversifying Things About Celebrities' Personal Life & Career Highlights At Married Celeb!!!
CNBC Journalist

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Hi, my name's Madi and I've been working at aquatic achievers for almost a year now. I'm studying law, political science and French at UQ and I don't remember what sleep is anymore. I'm not typically an adventurous person but I do like the idea of being an adventurous person. And earlier this year that idea was brought to life when I randomly booked a trip to Mount Everest. Go hard or go home, right?
I decided that doing this trek seemed like good idea at some point during my midlife crisis at the start of the year. Technically I'm 18, but I'm a big believer in never being too young to have a midlife crisis. I was unsure of the direction I was headed in or if uni was even the right pathway for me so rather than sitting down and thinking things through I opted to avoid all responsibilities and climb a mountain instead. It was slightly random but that's what made it so exciting! It was without a doubt the most challenging but satisfying thing I've done and led me to meeting some awesome people. I'm already on the lookout for my next adventure and can confirm the truth in the saying life begins at the end of your comfort zone.


The decision to close the site was not due to lack of input; rather lack of interest.  I placed ML items of interest to myself there, plus anthing ML related (that was valid) submitted by the community.  I was fine with new material being driven by the community; and if there was no new material from that group of folks, no problem.  I added things of my own interest.  But if so few are interested in using the information there, you don't have a viable site.  The features such as Buy/Sell/Trade, Local Bookstore Locations, Suggested ML Reading, etc. are not used at all.  The other information there is not used, as shown by the number of discussions on this list serv that are covered (at least partially) at the site.  It just made no sense to keep a site running with such low activity.
Perhaps the Marlins should do the same thing!


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text:
package com.example.episodicevents;

import org.springframework.amqp.rabbit.annotation.RabbitListener;
import org.springframework.data.mongodb.repository.MongoRepository;
import org.springframework.transaction.annotation.Transactional;

import java.util.List;

@RabbitListener(queues = "episodic-shows-queue")
@Transactional
public interface EventsRepository extends MongoRepository<Event, String> {
  public List<Event> findAll();

  public List<Event> findFirst20ByOrderByCreatedAtDesc();
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
\section{Introduction}
\label{sec:intro}
\input{1_intro.tex}

\section{Related Work}
\label{sec:related}
\input{2_related.tex}

\section{Problem Statement}
\label{sec:background}
\input{3_problem.tex}

\section{Joint Language-to-Pose }
\label{sec:model}
\input{4_model.tex}

\section{Experiments}
\label{sec:exp}
\input{5_exp.tex}

\section{Results and Discussion}
\label{sec:results}
\input{6_results.tex}

\section{Conclusions}
\label{sec:conclusions}
\input{7_conclusions.tex}

\section{Acknowledgements}
This material is based upon work partially supported by the National Science Foundation (Award \#1750439) and Oculus VR. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of National Science Foundation or Oculus VR. No official endorsement should be inferred.

{\small
\bibliographystyle{ieee}

\subsection{Joint modeling}

\subsection{Joint Embedding Space for Language and Pose}
To learn a joint embedding space of language and pose, the sentence $X_{1:N}$ and pose $Y_{1:T}$ are first mapped to a latent representation using a sentence encoder $p_e(X_{1:N}; \Phi_e)$ and a pose encoder $q_e(Y_{1:T}; \Psi_e)$ respectively. These estimate the latent representation or embeddings $z_x$ and $z_y$ respectively in the embedding space $\mathcal{Z} \subset \mathcal{R}^h$,

\begin{eqnarray}
z_x = p_e \left(X_{1:N}; \Phi_e \right)\\ \label{eq:encode}
z_y = q_e \left(Y_{1:T}; \Psi_e \right)
\end{eqnarray}

$z_x,z_y$ should lie close to each other in $\mathcal{Z}$ as they represent the same concept. To ensure that they do lie close together, a joint translation loss is constructed (refer to Figure \ref{fig:model}) and trained end to end with a training curriculum.

\subsection{Joint Loss Function}
\label{ssec:joint}
Once we have the embedding $z_x$ or $z_y$, a pose decoder $q_d(; \Psi_d)$ is used to generate an animation from the joint embedding space $\mathcal{Z}$. The output of the pose decoder must now lie close to the pose sequence $Y_{1:T}$. Hence, using $X_{1:N}$ as inputs and $Y_{1:T}$ as outputs, the cross-modal translation loss is defined as,
\begin{equation}
\label{eq:loss1}
    \mathcal{L}_c = d \left( q_d \left(  z_x; \Psi_d \right), Y_{1:T}\right)
\end{equation}
and using $Y_{1:T}$ as inputs and $Y_{1:T}$ as outputs, the uni-modal translation (or autoencoder) loss is defined as,
\begin{equation}
\label{eq:loss2}
    \mathcal{L}_u = d \left( q_d\left( z_y ; \Psi_d \right) , Y_{1:T}\right)
\end{equation}
where $d(x, y)$ is a function to calculate the distance between the predicted values and ground truth of pose. $\Phi_e$, $\Psi_e$ and $\Psi_d$ are trainable parameters of the sentence encoder, pose encoder and pose decoder respectively.

Combining equations \ref{eq:loss1} and \ref{eq:loss2} we get a joint translation loss,
\begin{equation}
    \label{eq:loss3}
    \mathcal{L}_j = \mathcal{L}_c + \mathcal{L}_u
\end{equation}
Jointly optimizing the loss $\mathcal{L}_j$ pushes $z_x$ and $z_y$ closer together improving generalizability and additionally trains the pose decoder which is useful for inference from the joint embedding space.

As $\mathcal{L}_j$ is a mutivariate function in $X_{1:N}$ and $Y_{1:T}$, coordinate descent \cite{wright2015coordinate} for optimizing the loss function is a natural choice and is described in Algorithm \ref{alg:1}.

\subsection{Training Curriculum}
\label{ssec:curriculum}
Cross modal pose forecasting can be a challenging task to train \cite{chao2017forecasting}. Starting with simpler examples before moving on to tougher ones can be beneficial to the training process \cite{bengio2009curriculum, zaremba2014learning, yang2015weakly}.

The curriculum design commonly used for pose forecasting \cite{chao2017forecasting} is adapted for our joint model. We first optimize the model to predict 2 time steps conditioned on the complete sentence. This easy task helps the model learn very short pose sequences like leg motions for walking, hand motions for waving and torso motions for bending. Once the loss on the validation set starts increasing, we move on to the next stage in the curriculum. The model is now given twice the amount of poses for prediction. The complexity of the task is increased in every stage till the maximum time-steps ($T$) of prediction is reached. We describe the complete training process in Algorithm \ref{alg:1}.

\input{z97_algorithm.tex}

\subsection{Optimization}
For the distance metric $d(x,y)$ in Equation \ref{eq:loss1}, \ref{eq:loss2} and \ref{eq:loss3}, Smooth L1 loss (similar to Huber Loss \cite{huber1992robust}) is used which is defined as,

\begin{equation}
    SmoothL1(x, y)=
    \begin{cases}
    0.5(x-y)^2 & \text{for } |x-y|<1 \\
    |x-y| - 0.5 & \text{otherwise}
    \end{cases}
\end{equation}
In contrast, Lin et. al.\cite{lin20181} uses L2 loss for $d(x,y)$. L2 loss is more sensitive to outliers than L1 loss due to its linearly proportional gradient with respect to the error, while L1 loss has a constant gradient of 1 or -1. But L1 Loss can become unstable when $|x-y| \approx 0$, due to oscillating gradients between 1 and -1. On the other hand, Smooth L1 is continuous and smooth near 0 and more generally for all $x, y \in \mathcal{R}$, hence it is more stable than L1 as a loss function.

\input{z98_table_main.tex}

\subsection{Dataset}
Our models are trained an evaluated on KIT Motion-Language Dataset \cite{Plappert2016} which combines human motion with natural language descriptions. It consists of 3911 recordings (approximately 11.23 hours) which are re-targeted to a kinematic model of a human skeleton with 50 DoFs (6 DoF for the \emph{Root} joint's orientation and position, while remaining 44 DoFs for arms legs, head and torso). The dataset also consists of 6278 English sentences (approximately 8 words per sentence) describing the recordings. This is more than the number of recordings as each recording has one or more descriptions which are annotated by human volunteers. We use 20\% of the data as a randomly sampled held-out set  for evaluating all models.

There is wide variety of motions in this dataset ranging from locomotion (e.g. walking, running, jogging), performing (e.g. playing violin/guitar), and gesticulation (e.g. waving). Many recording have adjectives to further describe the motion like speed (e.g. fast and slow), direction (left, right and forward), and number for periodic motions (e.g. walk 4 steps).

We use the pre-processing steps used in Holden et. al. \cite{holden2016deep}. All the frames of the motion are transformed such that body always faces the Z-axis. Joint rotation angles are transformed to 3D positions is the skeleton's local frame of reference with \emph{Root} as the origin. \emph{Root}'s position on XZ-plane and orientation along Y-axis is represented as velocity instead of absolute values.

Motion sequences are then sub-sampled to a frequency of 12.5 Hz down from 100Hz. This is low enough to bring enough variance between 2 time-steps for the decoder to train for a regression task, while not compromising on the human's perception of the animation \cite{chao2017forecasting}.

\subsection{Implementation Details}

For pose encoder ($q_e$) a network of Gated Recurrent Units (GRUs) \cite{cho2014properties} is used in our model JL2P. The pose decoder ($q_d$) is the same except it has residual connection from the input to the output layer. This is similar to the pose decoder in Lin et. al. \cite{lin20181}, except an extra layer to predict the trajectory (or Trajectory Predictor) is discarded in our model.

For langauge encoder ($p_e$), a network of Long-Short Term Memory Units (LSTMs) \cite{hochreiter1997long} is used. Each token of the sentence is converted into a distributional embedding using a pre-trained Word2Vec model \cite{mikolov2013distributed}. \footnote{We also train a variant of the model with BERT as the language encoder, but it did not show any significant improvements.}

\subsection{Baselines}
There has been limited work done in the domain of data-driven cross-modal translation from natural language descriptions to pose sequence generation. The closest work to our proposed approach is by \textbf{Lin et. al. } \cite{lin20181}\footnote{As we could not find code or pre-trained models for this work, we use our own implementation and training on the same data as all other baselines}. As mentioned in Section \ref{sec:related}, their model does not follow a training curriculum and uses L2 loss as the loss function. Thier model also maps the language embeddings to an existing embedding space of poses instead of jointly learning it.

We also compare our model \textbf{JL2P } (see Section \ref{sec:model}) with three ablations derived from itself. These ablations study the 3 main components of the model, joint embedding space, curriculum learning and Smooth L1 loss:
\begin{itemize}
    \item \textbf{JL2P  w/o Curriculum} - Training curriculum in Section \ref{ssec:curriculum} is dropped.
    \item \textbf{JL2P  w/o L1} - L2 loss is used instead of Smooth L1 loss as the distance metric $d(x,y)$.
    \item \textbf{JL2P  w/o Joint Emb.} - Instead of joint training as described in Section \ref{ssec:joint}, autoencoder loss $\mathcal{L}_u$ minimized first followed by optimization of the cross-translation loss $\mathcal{L}_c$.
\end{itemize}
\input{p8_renders.tex}

\subsection{Objective Evaluation Metrics}
\label{ssec:objective}
All models are evaluated on the held-out set with a metric Average Position Error (APE). Given a particular joint j, it can be denoted as $\mbox{APE}(j)$,
\begin{equation}
    \mbox{APE}(p) = \frac{1}{\mathcal{Y}}\sum_{\mathcal{Y}} \|\hat{y}_t[j] - y_t[j] \|_2
\end{equation}
where $y_t[j]$ is the true location and $\hat{y}_t[j] \in \mathcal{Y}$ is the predicted location of joint $j$ at time $t$

Another metric, Probability of Correct Keypoints (PCK) \cite{andriluka20142d, simon2017hand}, is also used as an evaluation metric.

\subsection{User Study: Subjective Evaluation Metric}
\label{ssec:subjective}
Joint language to pose generation is a subjective task, hence a human's subjective judgment on the quality of prediction is an important metric for this task.

To achieve this, we design a user study which asked human annotators to rank two videos generated by 2 different models but with same sentence as the input. One of the videos is generated by Lin et. al.  and the other is either ground truth or generated by JL2P , JL2P  w/o Curriculum, JL2P  w/o Joint Emb., or JL2P  L1.
The annotators answer the following question for each pair of videos, \emph{Which of the 2 generated animations is better described by "$<$sentence$>$"?}. To ensure that annotators spend enough time to decide, any annotations which took less than 20 seconds\footnote{each video is 8 seconds long at an average. We set a threshold of 20 seconds to give annotators 4 seconds to make their decision.} were rejected. This study subjectively evaluates the preference of humans for generated animations by different models.

\subsection{Prediction Accuracy by Joint Space}
JL2P  demonstrates at least a 9\% improvement over Lin et. al.  (see Table \ref{tab:main}) for all joints. The maximum improvement around 15\% is seen in the \emph{Root} joint. Errors in \emph{Root} prediction can lead to a "sliding-effect" of the feet; when the generation is translating faster than the frequency of the feet. Improvements in APE scores for long-term prediction, especially for \emph{Root}, can help get rid of these artifacts in the generated animation.

When compared to its variants, JL2P  loses maximum APE value when it is trained without curriculum (or JL2P  w/o Curriculum). As discussed in Section \ref{ssec:curriculum}, learning to predict shorter sequences before moving on to longer ones proves beneficial for pose generation. APE scores go down by 4\%, if L2 loss is used instead of Smooth L1. In an output space as diverse as pose sequences, it becomes important to ignore outliers which may drive model to overfit.
APE scores go down only by 1\%, if the embedding space is not trained with the joint loss $\mathcal{L}_j$

APE values across time for JL2P  of different parts of the body (\emph{Root, Legs, Arms, Torso} and \emph{Head}) are plotted in Figure \ref{fig:ape_joint}. \emph{Root}'s APE scores have the fastest rate of increase, followed by \emph{Arms, Legs} and then \emph{Head, Torso}. Two out of three coordinates of \emph{Root} are represented as velocity which accumulates errors when integrated back to absolute positions; this is probably a contributing factor to the rapid increase of prediction error over time.

Our final objective metric is PCK. PCK values (for 35$\leq\sigma\leq$55) on generated animations are compared among JL2P , its variants and Lin et. al.  in Figure \ref{fig:pck}. JL2P  and its ablations show a consistent improvement over Lin et. al.  which further strengthen the claim about the prediction accuracy by our model's joint space.
\input{p2_userstudy_main.tex}
\input{p5_ape_joint.tex}
\input{p1_pck.tex}
\subsection{Human Judgment}
Human judgment is quantified by preference scores in Figure \ref{fig:userstudy}. Human preference of all our baseline models and ground truth are compared against Lin et. al.  animations. JL2P  has a preference of 75\% which is shy of ground truth by 10\%. Preference scores consistently drop with all the other variants of JL2P .

JL2P  w/o Joint Emb. has the lowest preference score of 60\% when ranked against Lin et. al. . It is still more preferred than Lin et. al.  but far more unlikely to be picked when pitted against JL2P . This is an interesting change in trend, as removing joint loss from JL2P  did not affect the objective scores significantly, but have lowered its human preference by a significant fraction. This leads us to conclude that objective metrics are not enough to judge the performance of a model. Instead a combination of human judgment and objective metrics is necessary for evaluating pose generation models.

\subsection{Modeling nuanced language concepts}
\emph{Root} joint decides the trajectory of the animation which is crucial for translating concepts like speed (e.g. fast, and slow), direction (e.g. left, right, forward and backward) from natural language to animation. We plot the trajectories generated by JL2P, ground truth and Lin et. al.  for different sentences in Figure \ref{fig:trajectory}.

\textbf{Modeling direction:} Animations' trajectory for these sentences for JL2P  is similar to that of the ground truth trajectories. In contrast, Lin et. al.'s trajectories tend to be semantically incorrect and have a slightly curved forward motion for these sentences.

\textbf{Modeling speed:} In the sentence, "A person runs very fast forward", JL2P  is able to understand that the animation has to move faster. It is able to walk approximately the same distance as the ground truth in the same amount of time, hence has the same speed. In contrast, even though Lin et. al.'s motion is in the forward direction, it is not able to maintain the same speed as required by the sentence.

\textbf{Modeling actions: } In figure \ref{fig:renders}, we plot animations generated by a diverse set of sentences. JL2P  is able to understand the action from the sentences, and is able to generate an animation corresponding to the action. JL2P  is able to handle many actions ranging from \emph{kneeling} (with complex leg motions) to \emph{jogging} (with periodic hand and leg motion).

We show, via qualitative examples, that our model JL2P  is able to model nuanced language concepts which are then reproduced in the animations generated at inference time.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaArXiv


text:
Representing Individuals
Training – Coaching – Expert Witness
Ann Fromholz
Blog That Works
Investigating When A Complaining Employee Won't Cooperate
October 23, 2017 October 24, 2017 by lawpromo
By: Ann Fromholz
Originally published in Law360 on October 22, 2017
Earlier this year, an executive with a real estate developer alerted the company's general counsel that comments and rumors about her sex life that were circulating throughout the company, from hourly employees and assistants to the Csuite, were so personally and professionally damaging that she was too upset to work.
The general counsel took immediate action. He called the company's outside employment counsel, who advised that the company needed to conduct an immediate investigation into the executive's complaints. Because no one at the company was trained or equipped in workplace investigations, the lawyer advised that the company engage an outside expert, a lawyer whose practice focuses on workplace investigations.
As the investigator, I reviewed the complainant's demand letter and developed an
investigation plan. My first order of business was to interview the complaining employee (which is usually the case). But when I emailed and called the executive to schedule an interview, the executive did not respond. Finally, after three attempts without a response, the executive's lawyer responded that the executive would not agree to be interviewed.
This situation happens more frequently than one might imagine. A complaining employee, who may be the only person who can provide the details of her complaints, refuses to be interviewed. The employee may refuse because her lawyer recommends that she not be interviewed, she is too nervous to be interviewed, or some other reason. Whatever the reason, the investigator then needs to determine whether and how to investigate without the complainant's testimony.
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's existing enforcement guidance on harassment investigations requires a "prompt, thorough and impartial investigation" into complaints of workplace misconduct.[1] The guidance further provides that, "when detailed factfinding is necessary, the investigator should interview the complainant, the alleged harasser, and third parties who could reasonably be expected to have relevant information."
Even without an interview of the complainant, the investigator likely has enough information to determine which witnesses to interview and which questions to ask. The investigator may not know everything about the complaining party's complaints, but likely has enough information from the initial complaint to start asking questions. The answers to those questions, from witnesses other than the complainant, will often lead to other witnesses and other questions, and eventually can provide a fairly complete picture of the situation.
The EEOC proposed "Enforcement Guidance on Unlawful Harassment" in January 2017, but that guidance is not yet final.[2] The proposed guidance provides that an investigation is effective if it is sufficiently thorough to "arrive at a reasonably fair estimate of truth."
If, however, the investigator chooses to stop the investigation when the complaining party declines to be interviewed, the investigator risks failing in her duty to conduct a prompt, thorough and impartial investigation.
In May 2017, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing issued new guidance for preventing and addressing workplace harassment.[3] That guidance specifically addresses the basic steps to ensure a fair workplace investigation and says that due process is the goal. The guidance provides that the investigator should interview the complaining party, "give the accused party a chance to tell his/her side of the story," interview relevant witnesses, and review relevant documents.
The guidance also provides that the investigator "do other work that might be necessary for [her] to get all the facts," and "reach a reasonable and fair conclusion based on the information [she] collected, reviewed and analyzed during the investigation."
The DFEH guidance therefore makes clear that there are elements of an investigation that are as essential as the interview of the complaining party.
Once the employer is on notice of a complaint of workplace misconduct, the investigator should conduct those elements of the investigation regardless of whether the complaining party chooses to participate.
The investigator's report will detail the efforts to interview the complaining party and will detail the other steps the investigator took to conduct a thorough and fair investigation, even without the participation of the complaining party. The report will say that the complaining party refused to be interviewed and will say that the investigator is making factual findings and drawing a conclusion without the benefit of the complaining party's input. The investigator or the employer likely will report to the complaining party that the investigation has concluded without her involvement.
On occasion, the specter of the investigation concluding without the complaining party's input is enough to convince an otherwise recalcitrant complainant to participate, in some fashion, in an interview.
I know of investigations where the complainant insisted on being interviewed with her lawyer present and others where the complainant agreed to respond to written questions but still refused to be interviewed. Whether to agree to those terms is a judgment call that the investigator must make, weighing the benefit of gathering facts directly from the complainant against the diminished credibility of that testimony because it was influenced or perhaps even written by the complainant's lawyer. Of course, the report in such an investigation will reflect the relative weight that the investigator gives to the complainant's testimony as compared to testimony from witnesses who were more forthcoming.
The reluctant or refusing complainant creates a hurdle for a workplace investigator in her path to a complete investigation that arrives at a reasonably fair estimate of the truth. But the hurdle is one that a thorough and persistent investigator can overcome, either by thorough interviews of coworkers and other witnesses and a careful review of evidence, or by allowing the complainant to participate in the interview even with restrictions mandated by the complainant's lawyer.
The investigator's ultimate goal is to find the facts and reach a reasoned conclusion, not to stand on ceremony regarding exactly how the complainant ought to participate.
Weinstein Scandal Widens in Hollywood
Ann Fromholz participates in California Lawyer's 2017 Employment Roundtable
#MeToo Challenges Confidentiality and Nondisclosure Agreements
Hollywood's Harassment Investigations Dogged by Lack of Consistency
No More Quotes: How A Salary History Law Is Changing Hollywood For Women
Workplace Bullying and Harassment: What's the Difference?
Hostile Work Environment with Marc and Dennis
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The Fifth Element is a science fiction film directed, co-written, and based on a story by Luc Besson. Mostly set during the twenty-third century, the film's central plot involves the survival of planet Earth, which becomes the duty of a taxicab driver and former special forces Major, when a young woman (Leeloo) falls into his taxicab.
"Milla has this physical thing, she can be from the past or the future. She can be an Egyptian or a Roman. She can be Nefertiti and she can be from outer space. That was one thing I liked physically about her" Luc Besson.
This entry was posted in Fifth Element, Movies on July 17, 2014 by Cosplay Addict.


text:
MCB: Detroit Tigers' defense could be special in 2015
Overall, the Tigers should be between very good and excellent defensively up the middle in 2015.
MCB: Detroit Tigers' defense could be special in 2015 Overall, the Tigers should be between very good and excellent defensively up the middle in 2015. Check out this story on Freep.com: https://on.freep.com/1qSjwd7
By Tom Zahari, Special to the Detroit Free Press Published 10:45 a.m. ET Nov. 18, 2014
Detroit Tigers shortstop Jose Iglesias takes a throw at second base while taking infield practice at spring training in Lakeland, Fla., on Feb. 16, 2014.(Photo: Julian H. Gonzalez DFP)
Tom Zahari is a writer for the Detroit Tigers blog Motor City Bengals. His opinions do not reflect those of the Detroit Free Press nor its writers. You can read our Motor City Bengals blogs every week and find Tom on Twitter at @zaharitom7.
The Detroit Tigers' defense has been a weakness for the last number of years. Since 2010, the Tigers have rated 25th in total team defense by FanGraphs.
But those tides might turn. John Manuel of Baseball America pointed out in a tweet that the Tigers could be special up the middle this season.
The addition of Jose Iglesias in 2013 was a major defensive improvement, as he made almost every conceivable play at shortstop. Iglesias turned heads with his glove and drew comparisons to Ozzie Smith and Omar Vizquel, two legendary fielding shortstops. Iglesias missed all of 2014 because of shin injuries, and the Tigers struggled at shortstop in his absence. Eugenio Suarez and Andrew Romine did a nice job filling in, but they are not even close to Iglesias defensively.
Iglesias' return in 2015 should give the Tigers a vacuum at shortstop and help third baseman Nick Castellanos improve defensively by covering more ground behind him. Oglesias is a huge under-the-radar addition to the Tigers in 2015 if he can return to his preinjury form.
Ian Kinsler will be Iglesias' partner in the middle of the infield for the next few years. In 2014, Kinsler posted a 13.0 UZR, which was good for second in all of baseball. Kinsler is not one who makes the flashy plays, but he is elite because he makes every routine play and is elite in making what are defined as "even" (the defender will make the play 40%-60% of the time) and "likely" (60%-90%) plays. Kinsler made the likely plays 89.5% of the time and the even plays 68.4% of the time. If Kinsler and Iglesias are both healthy, they could be the best double-play combination in baseball.
The Tigers' acquisition of Anthony Gose for Devon Travis was a minor move to everyone outside of Toronto and Detroit, but it could become a major defensive addition for the Tigers. This was a nice move for the Tigers, as Travis would not have seen time at second base with Kinsler around, and his conversion to centerfield wasn't all that promising because of his lack of speed.
Gose, on the other hand, has speed to burn and uses it to his advantage in centerfield. In 2013, Gose played 65 games in center for Toronto. He posted a 7.0 UZR, which translates to a 23.0 UZR if he played 150 games. Gose's speed allowed him to make 100% of the routine plays, 100% of the likely plays and 50% of the even plays in centerfield in 2014. That would have been the best among all centerfielders in baseball. Gose's arm may not be his strongest attribute, but he definitely has a better arm than Rajai Davis.
Analyzing the Tigers' outfield after Anthony Gose trade
The final piece of the puzzle up the middle for the Tigers is Alex Avila at catcher. With Avila, the Tigers had the third-best defensive catcher in 2014, as rated by FanGraphs, and sixth, as rated by defensive WAR. Avila does a great job of blocking balls (his three passed balls this season were best in baseball), handling the pitching staff and throwing out runners (his CS% was second in all of baseball).
Overall, the Tigers should be between very good and excellent defensively up the middle in 2015. They should cover a lot of ground in spacious Comerica Park, barring injuries. With the middle so well covered, it also should allow players at the corners to adjust their positioning and reach more balls. Overall, the Tigers should be an improved defensive squad in 2015.


I am happy to announce that my retelling of a story from the Malay Annals has just been published in an anthology to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the Commonwealth Institute. There is a story or poem from every Commonwealth country and my Raja Suran story represents Singapore. There is a foreword by Prince Charles and my favourite illustrator, Jan Pienkowski did the illustrations.


Our family still recalls the joy we felt in the Summer of 2012.
The Summer of the London Olympics.
My wife could barely walk 20 steps without stopping for breath.
So we pushed her around the Olympic Stadium, and allowed 30 minutes to climb the steps to our seats.
But the scenes we witnessed still bring smiles to our faces and wonder to our hearts.
Yes, we rejoiced in seeing the might of athletes like Ennis and Farah, Hoy, Trott and Wiggins, Ainslei and DuJardin, Rutherford and Stanning.
But the Paralympic Athletes – the Superhumans – made us gasp in genuine awe.
Beefy, grizzly men either side of us bawled like babies at the sight of the David Weirs and the Hannah Cockcrofts with jet propelled wheelchairs.
Our spirits were lifted, not just by their vanquishing their competitors and claiming Gold.
But also by their overcoming "Am I Less Than?" to become "Greater Than We Thought Possible!".
Competition demands the best of us.
But I wonder – when this spills over into our working life – whether we know when to stop competing, vanquishing, dominating.
I see messages that encourage us to be powerful, fierce, self-glorifying.
We continue to separate, divide, go our own way. Become Them and Us.
I watched a video this morning which reminded me that what I really need – in my personal and business life – is to grow more kind. To be more loving. To be more generous.
I thought back to the two people – a Financial Planner and a Compliance Manager – each of whom I coached, Pro Bono, for an hour this week.
I felt like laughing with the enjoyment of it all.
It's likely they will never become clients.
But surely I can afford one hour to help someone who feels lost, confused?
When I behave like that, it washes back and flows over me.
I feel more at peace.
To find opportunities to be more generous, sensitive, collaborative; less desperate for our share, or our need to be right.
Doesn't this make of our world a more delightful, more peaceful place?


Whereas custom has the defending Tremendous Bowl champion starting the brand new NFL season, the league is making ready to go in a special route to commemorate its 100th season.
The NFL is making ready to have the Inexperienced Bay Packers go to the Chicago Bears as its Thursday evening opener for the 2019 season, John Ourand of Sports activities Enterprise Journal stories. Whereas this spot has gone to the defending Tremendous Bowl champion since 2006, the league desires to showcase its oldest rivalry as a part of a celebration of its 100th season, with the competition airing on NBC.
The Bears and Packers have performed 198 occasions all through historical past, with their first assembly coming all the way in which again in 1921. This may even be the second straight 12 months that the 2 groups met in primetime in Week 1 after the Packers topped the Bears at Lambeau Subject within the first Sunday evening sport of the 2018 season.
Whereas this alternative would go away the Patriots out of the standard highlight for reigning champions, their first dwelling sport also needs to be on in primetime. Ourand notes that the Pats will probably have their dwelling opener as the primary Sunday Night time Soccer sport of the season, though the opponent for that sport seems to be up within the air.
The Patriots have a pretty dwelling schedule that includes dates with the Cowboys, Giants, Steelers, Browns, and Chiefs exterior of their divisional opponents. The Steelers seem to be a logical alternative right here for the reason that NFL would need to save the large AFC Championship rematch with Kansas Metropolis for November, when the league tends to stack large matchups in prime time for sweeps functions.
Ourand additionally discusses just a few different issues within the piece, however the one in every of most curiosity to informal followers is potential Thanksgiving matchups. The evening sport remains to be up within the air, however Ourand says that the league will "probably" have the Bears in Detroit on Turkey Day whereas the Cowboys host the Miami Dolphins.


text:
Book Proof – reading and editing
Translations From Greek to English
Full book editing
Cover design & layout
Book marketing & press coverage
warriors of Hallan, The book of the epic fantasy trilogy by Evie Photopoulos
GLOBAL BOOK NEWS
Eleni Paiteri Foundation
International Book Contest
Contest "THE SECOND WAVE"
Success Stories OnTime Books
Playing with Alice
By Delina Vasiliadi
Choose an optioneBookPaperback Clear
Playing with Alice quantity
Delina Vasiliadi
Marc is a very famous and, most importantly, popular writer and playwright. Almost all of his plays and novels have become huge commercial and artistic successes. This means fame, glory, fans and, of course, money. But at this specific point in his life Marc is facing difficulties. He is trapped at a "writer's block" and is unable to write. His reputation is at stake; his lifestyle also. His fans, as well as his editor, demand a new masterpiece better than the previous ones… Marc is desperate. So he calls upon the Muse to help him. But she doesn't respond. He keeps calling and calling… And at some point, the Muse appears… Alice appears. Marc believes she has come to help him achieve his artistic goals… But Alice has come to seduce Marc into following her on a path with no return, where all secrets are revealed and the truth, that has been hidden for a very long time, comes to light! Marc will eventually comprehend the truth about himself. Who he is, what he wanted and what he did or sacrificed to get it. And then the final question will appear: "Was it worth it?"
Delina Vasiliadi (Vasileiadou Despoina's pen name) was born, lives and works in Greece. She is married and has a daughter, Myrtali. Her love for arts, colours, books, painting and writing became apparent at an extremely young age. She studied painting next to her mother Lizetta Vasiliadi and Stelios Mavromatis - both very famous Greek painters. Delina studied Economics, Finance and Accounting at University of Macedonia with a full scholarship, was the Valedictorian of her graduation year, graduated with honors and distinction. She, also, studied Stage and Film Acting and Directing and took several classes, seminars and master classes in theater and film (acting, directing, writing). For years she worked at the financial sector, but now she is fully devoted to the arts, especially in writing, where she has won several important literary awards. She has received twice the Prize for Plays by the Greek Authors' Association (2017, 2018), a Commendation for Plays (2018) and the Third Prize for Fairy tales (2020) by the Panhellenic Authors' Association, the First (2019) and the Second (2018) Prize for Short Stories and a Commendation (2018) for a fairy tale by Club Unesco, the Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots Prize (2019) for a fairytale, twice the Writer's Union of Northern Greece Prize (2019, 2020) for a fairy tale, a Commendation (2019) and the Third Prize (2018) for fairytales by the Keratsini Science, Culture and Arts Company and the Anima Publishing House Prize for fairytales (2017). The fairy tale "Romi and Miranda" was included at the Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots "Books of the year 2019" list and won the Second Prize at the International LINOS literary competition (publications 2019-2020), while the fairy tale "The lost colors of the rainbow" was proclaimed "Children's book of the year 2017" and received the First Literary Magazine Kefalos Prize. The play "Passage" (Prize for Plays by the Greek Authors' Association 2017) was proclaimed "Play of the year 2018" and received the Literary Magazine Kefalos Prize and the play "Playing with Alice" (First Prize for Plays by the Greek Authors' Association 2018), which was proclaimed "Play of the year 2019" and received the Literary Magazine Kefalos Prize, was included at the Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots "Books of the year 2019" list. The play "Home-made Paradise" was included at the Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots "Books of the year 2020" list. She has been writing theatrical reviews and articles about the theatre for years, since 2007, illustrated the fairytale "The miser" for the book "Storytellers and Painters", acted in video-art projects, documentaries and films in Greece and abroad and worked for the National Theatre of Northern Greece as Assistant Director, Director and Author. Delina has exhibited solo several times in Greece and abroad. In 2014 she was selected to exhibit her artwork under the Greek Presidency of the Council of the European Union in Luxembourg at the European Commission and then in Brussels, again, at the European Commission. Some of Delina's fairytales, plays and stories have been presented on the radio in Greece and abroad, while some others have been published in literary magazines and many of her paintings were included in art books and are now in several private and public collections (Europe, U.S.A.). Many Greek and foreign Media all around the globe (radio, TV, blogs, newspapers) have made tributes to her work (painting and writing). In 2020 her play "Passage" was presented at the "Hephaestus Radio" in Austria, while in 2021 it was included at The Greek Play Project NY 2021. In 2021 Delina's play "Playing with Alice" was presented at the 9th HRTFest in Athens. In 2022 the play "Passage" will be presented on stage in Thessaloniki, Greece. Six of her children's books have been published by Michalis Sideris Publishing House in Greece. The Publishing House Anemoessa has included her play "Lullaby" at its collective volume "Εν αρχή ην το τέλος" ("At the beginning there is the end") and The KAPA Publishing House that has already published three of her plays ("Passage", "Playing with Alice", "Home-made Paradise"), soon will publish three more, "Paper Fates", "Free fall" and "Loves me, loves me not". Delina is a permanent member of the Greek Authors' Association and the Hellenic Literary Society. In 2020 Delina joined the Greek Play Project. For more information please visit: www.delinavasiliadi.gr http://www.greek-theatre.gr/public/gr/greekplay/index/view/86 Publications in Greece and abroad: 2021 "The boy that didn't fit in" (children's book, Greek) Michalis Sideris Publishing House 2021 "The girl that fed the birds" (children's book, Greek) Michalis Sideris Publishing House 2021 "The pacifier Fairy" (children's book, Greek) Michalis Sideris Publishing House 2021 "Passage" (play, English) On time Books 2020 "Home-made Paradise" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House 2020 "Lullaby" (play, Greek) Anemoessa Publishing House – collective volume 2019 "Playing with Alice" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House 2019 "Romi and Miranda" (children's book, Greek) Michalis Sideris Publishing House 2018 "Passage" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House 2018 "The lost colors of the rainbow" (children's book, Greek) Michalis Sideris Publishing House 2018 "The pacifier fairy" (children's book, Greek) Anima Publishing House Soon to be published in English: "Playing with Alice" (play, English) On time Books "Paper Fates" (play, English) On time Books Soon to be published in Greek: "Free fall" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House "Paper Fates" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House "Loves me loves me not" (play, Greek) Kapa Publishing House Literary awards: "Playing with Alice":
2018 First Prize_Greek Authors' Association
2018 Commendation_Panhellenic Authors' Association
2020 First Prize_literary magazine Kefalos ("Book-Play of the year 2019")
2020 the play was included at the "Books of the year 2019" list_Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots
"Home-made Paradise":
"Passage":
2017 Prize_Greek Authors' Association
2020 First Prize-literary magazine Kefalos ("Book-Play of the year 2018")
"The lost colors of the rainbow":
2020 First Prize_literary magazine Kefalos ("Book-Children's Book of the year 2017")
"Romi and Miranda":
2020 Second Prize at the international competition LINOS
"The boy that didn't fit in" (fairytale):
2019 First Prize_Club Unesco(Greece)
2019 Commendation_ Writers' Union of Northern Greece
2019 Commendation_literary magazine Kefalos
2019 Second Prize_ Hellenic Cultural Association of Greek Cypriots
2020 Third Prize_ Panhellenic Authors' Association
"The dream-carriers" (fairytale):
2018 Second Prize_Club Unesco(Greece)
"Adventure on the Island of the Fairies" (fairytale with rhyme):
2019 Third Prize_Writers' Union of Northern Greece
2019 Commendation_Keratsini Science, culture & arts company
2019 Distinction_literary magazine Kefalos
"The little star" (fairytale):
2018 Commendation_Club Unesco(Greece)
"The guardian of lost dreams" (fairytale):
2018 Third Prize_Keratsini Science, culture & arts company
"The pacifier fairy":
2017 Prize_Anima Publishing House
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As the sun reaches its most northerly position relative to the earth, the bees also reach their maximum strength. The summer solstice, which occurs on June 21st, brings the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. It also marks a delineation between the two broad seasons in the year of a beehive: the season of expansion and the season of contraction.
During the period prior to the summer solstice, honeybees are generally expanding their population, growing in anticipation of the longer days and the late spring and summer nectar flows. Bees are highly sensitive to the patterns of the sun. Not only is their navigation system based on the daily position of the sun, but they also respond to the lengthening and shortening of days by adjusting their populations accordingly. Their proclivity to expand their populations is, to a large degree, based on the length of daylight.
Within several weeks after the sun reaches its maximum strength, honeybees begin to sense the shortening days. This change roughly marks the transition from the season of expansion to the season of contraction. By mid to late summer, due to the shortening days, most queen bees will have cut back on their brood laying, which will result in the beginning of the seasonal decline in bee populations.
As June arrives and the beekeeping season reaches its peak, we begin to think about our annual county beekeeping inspection, which is right around the corner. Above is a photo that we took from last year's inspection.
Our county beekeeping inspectors arrive in mid-summer in full force; armed with the latest beekeeping technology, multi-layered beekeeping suits, range-finding binoculars, foulbrood inspection kits, and carrying checklists that seem to be miles long. They ask questions such as, "Where is the water source in this apiary? How many colonies do you have here? How close is the nearest residence? What fire prevention steps are you taking, etc.? These questions can go on and on, lasting the better part of a morning.
Of course, the inspectors have to live up to their title, and also inspect actual bee colonies for evidence of foul brood, varroa mites, viruses, diseases, colony temperament, and so on. At Wildflower Meadows, we have few concerns with third-party colony inspections, since as queen breeders, we regularly do the same inspections, and are hyper-vigilant in guarding against diseases. It is our job to regularly monitor the health and temperament of our own colonies, and we take this responsibility seriously.
Sometimes, however, the thoroughness and breadth of the inspectors' checklists catches us off guard. We were written up last year for not sufficiently trimming the weeds in an access road leading up to one of our apiaries. We wrote about weed trimming last year, when we mentioned how beekeepers are sometimes hesitant to remove pollen sources from around the bees. We are no different: flowering weeds are precious pollen sources, and like many beekeepers, it breaks our heart to be forced to remove them! The inspectors, however, in their quest for fire prevention (which obviously is very important in California) had no patience for our arguments. We are now required to get more serious about our weed trimming responsibilities, oftentimes trimming in places that we never even thought about before . . .
Who knows what the inspectors will come up with this year? Nevertheless, we are feeling confident. Our colonies are looking great, our water sources are full, and our apiaries are weed-free. And, at least for now, we are ready for the next round of inspections!
A successful beehive inspection begins even before a beekeeper opens the colony. Sometimes, if the weather is too cold or otherwise unpleasant, an outside inspection may be all that a conscientious beekeeper will want to do for the day. Not every day is ideal for opening a beehive.
No matter what the conditions, however, an astute beekeeper can learn much about a colony's health simply by carefully observing the bees outside of the colony and considering . . .
Given the conditions of weather and bloom, is the level of activity taking place on the entrance greater or lower than what would be expected?
Are the bees bringing in pollen?
Are there signs of robbing or defensive behavior?
Are the bees fighting off invading insects such as wasps or ants?
Are there dead bees lying in front of the entrance?
Once a beekeeper decides to open a colony, the beekeeper will next want to consider . . .
Are the bees in a cluster? This will indicate the location and size of the brood nest.
Does the colony feel heavy with honey? Or, does it have enough food?
What does the inside of the brood nest look like? Is there a good mix of eggs, larva and capped brood? No eggs may indicate that the hive is without a queen.
Does the larva look healthy, bright and white?
Does the larva look "wet" and well fed? Dry larva may indicate that the colony is starved for pollen and could benefit from pollen supplement patties.
Does the capped brood look healthy, compact and well shaped? Spotty brood may indicate disease or a failing queen.
Given the bee population and conditions of the season, do the bees have the right amount of space?
Are there swarm cells or signs that the colony may be planning to swarm?
A careful beekeeper always considers the well-being of the colony during the inspection. The goal of the inspection is for the beekeeper to help the colony, if necessary, and not to overly stress the colony with too much invasiveness or rough handling. At the end of the inspection, the beekeeper should replace the combs in the same order, and close up the hive as securely as it was before the inspection.
Wildflower Meadows is not in the business of rescuing or catching swarms, and it is generally not something that we spend a lot of time doing. When it comes to swarm catching, we let other beekeepers have all the fun!
However, once in a while we run into swarms that demand our attention. Sometimes a mating nuc has swarmed into a tree outside the apiary and needs to be brought back into place. At other times, one of our colonies has swarmed near a neighbor's house and the neighbor is panicked and calling for assistance. Occasionally, we may find that a giant swarm has arrived right next to our breeders. We strive to keep swarms away from our breeders lest they even think about entering a breeder colony and possibly usurping a champion breeder queen. In all these cases, we need to take action and give our best efforts to corral the swarm into a better place.
This is when the swarm lure proves to be an invaluable tool. The swarm lure is a bait of essential oils that is highly attractive to a traveling swarm. The mixture of oils is designed to either smell like an appealing beehive, or to mimic the smell of the Nasonov gland. The Nasonov gland is the gland in a honeybee that emits the pheromones that call bees together. Ideally, a good swarm lure immediately catches the swarm's attention and directs the flight path in the direction of the lure.
There are many different recipes for swarm lures, many of which can be discovered with an Internet search. Other commercial swarm lures come pre-formulated, and are sold by nearly all of the beekeeping supply companies. Our personal favorite is the Swarm Commander, which is a proprietary mix of essential oils that reliably directs swarms into our waiting equipment.
When working with a powerful swarm lure like the Swarm Commander, our beekeepers need to be careful not to spill any! Wherever the lure goes, the bees follow. Even an accidental drop on top of the head is enough to cause problems for an entire day!
Spring arrives at different times in different parts of the United States. Here, at Wildflower Meadows, our spring begins in early February. For some of our customers, whose apiaries are in the north of the country or are in the mountains, spring can arrive as late as the middle of May or early June. Regardless of the timing, however, spring beekeeping activities are the same for all beekeepers.
Spring is a time when the population of a beehive is about to grow rapidly. The queen has begun to lay new frames of brood in earnest. Often in the early spring a beehive may appear to contain more frames of brood than bees! Accordingly, most spring beekeeping is focused on managing the expansion of the bee population and gearing up for an oncoming spring honey flow.
Although it is important for a beekeeper to ensure that bees have enough space heading into spring, a good beekeeper does not want to get too carried away by adding too many supers, or adding supers too early in the season. Sometimes early an spring will bring unexpected frosts or chilly weather. Too much space inside a beehive can make it difficult for the bees to keep the nighttime cluster warm and could result in the brood being chilled.
An adult worker honeybee typically progresses through a series of roles during her short life span. During her first two weeks of life she assumes the role of nurse bee, staying inside of the colony, tending to the larvae and to the many needs of the queen bee. By the start of her third week, still inside the colony she takes on a slightly different role of an "intermediate" bee; a worker bee who has not quite graduated to foraging status yet. Her work at this point mostly consists of receiving and storing nectar from the forager bees, producing wax, and building comb.
By the start of the third week, however, a worker bee "graduates" her housekeeping duties and finally becomes a forager. She will begin by taking a series of training flights to get oriented, and then ultimately heads out into the open world to forage for nectar, pollen, water, and propolis. The transition to foraging is more or less a death sentence for a worker bee. The risks to a foraging bee's life are vastly higher than to a young bee that stays safely inside a well-secured colony. Not only does a foraging bee have to deal with predators such as swallows and other bee-eating birds, a forager faces a multitude of environmental dangers such as cold, heat, drowning, spider webs, car windshields, etc. Of course, a forager also can get lost or exhausted in her many daily trips to and from the colony.
A foraging bee makes an average ten to fifteen foraging trips per day! With this heavy workload, even the strongest and luckiest forager bee only will live about another three weeks while foraging. Assuming an intrepid foraging bee makes it through the gauntlet of dangers during her daily foraging, sadly her little wings will eventually wear out from all the hard work. By her third week of foraging she reaches the end of her short lifespan.
Central to all queen-rearing activities is the queen mating yard, where the queens make their home between the time that they are hatched from a queen cell, until the time that they are ready for sale. A typical commercial queen mating yard contains hundreds of mating nuclei, each with at least a pound of worker bees, a small frame or two of brood, sufficient honey stores or feed, and a queen cell.
First and most importantly, all mating yards need to be within optimal flying distance (approximately one half mile, give or take) to our drone-rearing colonies. There has to be an abundance of quality drones in the area; otherwise, what's the point?
The mating yard should also be near rich pollen sources. Young, growing queens need proper nutrition during their formative days, and nearby pollen enables the queens to be well nourished as they prepare for and take their multiple mating flights.
An ideal queen-mating yard must also have landmarks, such as trees or bushes interspersed throughout the yard. That way the queens do not get lost when returning home from their mating flights.
And, the mating yard should be free from ants or other small pests that can overrun the small and relatively defenseless mating nucs.
The above photo is one of our favorite mating yards, and has all the key elements to make it a success. It also features an additional benefit that we didn't mention above: beautiful tall pine trees that provide plenty of shade for a relaxing lunch break after a morning of selecting and caging queen bees!
Just like human security guards watching over and protecting an important home, guard bees have the same responsibilities for their colony. Their mission: keep the colony's inhabitants safe from intruders.
The obvious weapon that a guard bee utilizes, of course, is its powerful sting. There is more, however, to being a guard bee than stinging. Like a human security guard, a guard bee must also be attentive, be able to distinguish between normal activity and real threats, and also be able to quickly call for assistance, if needed.
A typical strong colony usually has about ten to twenty guard bees at a time patrolling the entrance of the hive. This number can change depending on the size of the entrance, the season, nearby pressure from robbing, or presence of other threats. Obviously, if a large-sized predator such as a bear approaches a beehive, ten guard bees is not going to be enough to deter an attack. In that case, the guard bees quickly call for reinforcements, using an alarm pheromone. In such an attack, the entire colony is placed on alert, and all worker bees temporarily become guard bees, sacrificing their lives to protect the colony.
Given that the bees inside of a colony will generally only tolerate one queen, and that queen bees themselves fight amongst each other if they are in the same colony, it is obvious that when raising queen bees, each queen needs to be provided its own separate colony. It is impossible to raise more than one queen inside of a single colony, as queen bees do not tolerate "roommates." Each queen needs her own castle to call home!
This issue quickly becomes a challenge when raising thousands of queens at a time. If each queen needs her own colony, and the queen producer needs to set up a separate colony for every queen being raised, then this can quickly become a logistical and costly endeavor. This process could be considered similar to trying to run an army where every soldier needs a separate apartment, and cannot tolerate living with another soldier.
The only reasonable and cost-effective solution to this problem is to set up small-sized and inexpensive colonies, one for each queen that is being raised.
The majority of beekeepers who raise bees in standard Langstroth colonies are familiar with the three sizes of frames available to them, full size (deep), medium size and small size. These three frame sizes correspond to the three sizes of hive bodies that beekeepers traditionally use, deep hive bodies, medium supers, and shallow supers, respectively. Nearly all beekeepers who use standard beekeeping equipment use one or more of these sized frames.
The majority of queen producers, however, utilize a fourth size of frame, which is known as a mini-mating frame. The mini-mating frame is roughly half the size of a shallow frame. Three of these small mini-mating frames are just large enough to provide a comfortable living space for a small colony, and most importantly, enough space for a queen to lay a good pattern of brood and prove the quality of her mating and genetics.
Given the small size of the frame, a high-quality queen can easily fill a mini-mating frame, such as the frame above, in less than a day. The mini-mating frame shown above, filled with brood, is proof that this queen bee is ready for sale. To us, she is "showing off" her talents. She is more than ready to visit a "real" and full-sized colony and continue her fine brood laying talents for one of Wildflower Meadows' customers.


text:
Q: Why does the "A" disappear? I'm going through some Zend PHP certification questions and am stuck on this one:
What is the output of the following:
<?php

class Magic{

    public $a = "A";
    protected $b = array("a" => "A", "b" => "B", "c" => "C");
    protected $c = array(1,2,3);

    public function __get($v){
        echo "$v,";
        return $this->b[$v];
    }

    public function __set($var, $val){
        echo "$var: $val,";
        $this->$var = $val;
    }

}

$m = new Magic();
echo $m->a.",".$m->b.",".$m->c.",";
$m->c = "CC";
echo $m->a.",".$m->b.",".$m->c;

Answer: b,c,A,B,C,c: CC,b,c,A,B,C
I know that __get() and __set are called when trying to access/set inaccessible properties but can someone tell me what happens to the $m->a? I.e why does it disappear?
Thanks in advance

A: echo $m->a.",".$m->b.",".$m->c.",";

Note that the string is being concatenated, but that __get outputs the name of the key. The lower case letters are key names, the upper case letters are the values.

b,c,A,B,C,c: CC,b,c,A,B,C

a is accessed normally, not through __get, b and c are accessed through __get and the keys are echo'd first, their value is then returned, concatenated into the string and output after the output of "b,c,".
So what this shows is that the __get method is triggered for b and c but not for a, then the values "A", "B" and "C" are output, then the value "CC" is set, then b and c are accessed through __get again, then "A", "B" and "C" are output again.

A: all the variables in the line
$m->a.",".$m->b.",".$m->c.","

are first parsed, before it is echoed.
So the call to $m->b executes the __get magic method, which then  echos "$v,";, same with the call to $m->c.
Only after all the values is parsed (and the output from the __get method echoed), then the return values is echoed.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
local transform = {}
transform.__index = transform
local ink = {}
local atan2 = math.atan2
local sqrt  = math.sqrt
local cos   = math.cos
local sin   = math.sin

function transform.new (_ink)
    local self = {
        entities = {},
        name = 'transform',
        requires = {'transform'}
    }
    ink = _ink
    setmetatable(self, transform)
    return self
end

local function _update_transform_by_parent (entity)
    local parent_position = entity.parentId ~= 0
                                and ink:getEntity(entity.parentId).transform.position
                                or {x = 0, y = 0}

    local parent_rotation = entity.parentId ~= 0
                                and ink:getEntity(entity.parentId).transform.rotation
                                or 0

    local parent_scale = entity.parentId ~= 0
                                and ink:getEntity(entity.parentId).transform.scale
                                or {x = 1, y = 1}

    entity.transform.position.x = entity.transform.position.x + parent_position.x
    entity.transform.position.y = entity.transform.position.y + parent_position.y

    entity.transform.rotation = entity.transform.rotation + parent_rotation

    entity.transform.scale.x = entity.transform.scale.x * parent_scale.x
    entity.transform.scale.y = entity.transform.scale.y * parent_scale.y
end

function transform.get_corner_position (entity_transform, scale_x_in_pixels, scale_y_in_pixels)
    local corner_position = {
        x = entity_transform.position.x - scale_x_in_pixels * entity_transform.scale.x * entity_transform.pivot.x,
        y = entity_transform.position.y - scale_y_in_pixels * entity_transform.scale.y * entity_transform.pivot.y
    }

    local finalAngle = atan2(corner_position.y - entity_transform.position.y,
                                corner_position.x - entity_transform.position.x
                            ) + entity_transform.rotation

    local magnitude = sqrt((corner_position.x - entity_transform.position.x)
                                * (corner_position.x - entity_transform.position.x)
                                + (corner_position.y - entity_transform.position.y)
                                * (corner_position.y - entity_transform.position.y))

    local vector = {
        x = cos(finalAngle) * magnitude,
        y = sin(finalAngle) * magnitude
    }

    corner_position.x = entity_transform.position.x + vector.x
    corner_position.y = entity_transform.position.y + vector.y

    return corner_position
end

function transform.update (entity)
    _update_transform_by_parent(entity)
end

return transform


text:
You are here: Home / News / Special Red Cross blood drive held in honor of mother battling cancer
Special Red Cross blood drive held in honor of mother battling cancer
The community is invited to give blood in honor of Stephanie Dillon at a special American Red Cross blood drive held in her name Wednesday, May 1 from 3:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Miller High School in Corning.
CORNING, Ohio (DATE, 2019) — The community is invited to give blood in honor of Stephanie Dillon at a special American Red Cross blood drive held in her name Wednesday, May 1 from 3:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Miller High School in Corning.
Stephanie is a well-loved teacher, colleague and friend to the students and staff at Miller High School, and she is known to be a loving mother and wife. She enjoys outdoor activity, being a blood donor and being active in her community. In January of this year she was diagnosed with breast cancer and is currently undergoing treatment.
"Stephanie has many people supporting her at Miller High School," said Karianne Havlichek, Stephanie's coworker. "We would like to see the entire community donate to show support for Steph."
"There are so many reasons why someone may need blood that we don't even realize," said Lori Gaitten, donor recruitment account manager for the Red Cross. "We take for granted that blood will be there at the hospital when we need it, but it can only come from generous volunteer donors. Giving blood in Stephanie's name is a wonderful way to honor her and potentially help others."
Every two seconds in the United States blood is needed to respond to patient emergencies, including accident and burn victims, heart surgery and organ transplant patients, and those receiving treatment for leukemia, cancer or sickle cell disease. The Red Cross must collect more than 13,000 blood and platelet donations every day for the patients at about 2,500 hospitals nationwide, including 41 hospitals in Central Ohio.
Donate blood in honor of Stephanie Dillon
3:30 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Miller High School
10397 State Route 155, Corning, OH 43730
How to donate blood
Simply download the Red Cross Blood Donor App, visit RedCrossBlood.org or call 1-800-RED CROSS (1-800-733-2767) to make an appointment or for more information. All blood types are needed to ensure a reliable supply for patients. A blood donor card or driver's license or two other forms of identification are required at check-in. Individuals who are 17 years of age in most states (16 with parental consent where allowed by state law), weigh at least 110 pounds and are in generally good health may be eligible to donate blood. High school students and other donors 18 years of age and younger also have to meet certain height and weight requirements.
Blood and platelet donors can save time at their next donation by using RapidPass® to complete their pre-donation reading and health history questionnaire online, on the day of their donation, from a computer or mobile device. To get started and learn more, visit RedCrossBlood.org/RapidPass and follow the instructions on the site.
About the American Red Cross
The American Red Cross shelters, feeds and provides emotional support to victims of disasters; supplies about 40 percent of the nation's blood; teaches skills that save lives; provides international humanitarian aid; and supports military members and their families. The Red Cross is a not-for-profit organization that depends on volunteers and the generosity of the American public to perform its mission. For more information, please visit redcross.org or cruzrojaamericana.org, or visit us on Twitter at @RedCross.


text:
A.I. Helped Uncover Chinese Boats Hiding in North Korean Waters
Yael Grauer, WIRED UK
A combination of technologies helped scientists discover a potentially illegal fishing operation involving more than 900 vessels.
A new study details how more than 900 vessels of Chinese origin likely caught more than 160,000 metric tons of Pacific flying squid over two years. Photographer: Chu Yang/Alamy
Huge fleets of Chinese fishing boats have been caught stealthily operating in North Korean waters—while having their tracking systems turned off. The potentially illegal fishing operation was revealed through a combination of artificial intelligence, radar, and satellite data.
A study published today in the journal Science Advances details how more than 900 vessels of Chinese origin (over 900 in 2017 and over 700 in 2018) likely caught more than 160,000 metric tons—close to half a billion dollars' worth—of Pacific flying squid over two years. This may be in violation of United Nations sanctions, which began restricting North Korea from foreign fishing in September 2017 following the country's ballistic missile tests.
Illegal fishing threatens fish stocks and maritime ecosystems, and it can jeopardize food security for legitimate fishers. However, the practice is difficult to monitor because of so-called dark fleets—boats that don't appear on monitoring systems. Even if the vessels are operating legally and broadcasting their positions on the monitoring systems mandated by their country, that data is sometimes hidden from the public, limiting transparency and accountability.
In the study, scientists from South Korea, Japan, Australia, and the United States combined four different technologies to piece together information about the fleets, some of which may show up using one tool but not another. These include automatic identification system (AIS), radar images, infrared imaging, and high-res optical images.
AIS is a tracking system, much like GPS, that uses transponders to send the vessel's location at sea. Although it provides detailed movement information, only a fraction of vessels that use GPS broadcast their positions. "Most of the vessels operating do not use this and are 'dark,' meaning they don't appear in public surveillance systems, and the ones that did broadcast did so relatively infrequently," says David Kroosdma, director of research and innovation at the international nonprofit Global Fishing Watch and coauthor of the study. The ones that did broadcast AIS all originated from Chinese ports and fished in Chinese water.
To track down the vessels, this AIS data was supplemented with satellite synthetic aperture radar images—or, more simply put, pictures of boats taken from space. The satellite imagery penetrates clouds and allows researchers to identify large metal vessels, but it doesn't regularly cover all oceans.
Visible infrared imaging radiometer suite, or VIIRS, was also used. This collects global nighttime satellite imagery. It can detect vessels that use bright lights, in this case to lure squid to the surface. However, image clarity is limited by clouds. And finally, while high-resolution optical imagery can provide visual confirmation of vessel types and their activity, it is limited by clouds and is often not available at a high enough resolution, or frequently enough, to monitor fishing fleets in some sea zones.
The researchers trained a convolutional neural network to identify pair trawlers, which have a distinctive fishing pattern and comprise the largest portion of foreign vessels in the region. They used the neural network to identify the location of the fleet, and then used satellite imagery to further verify the vessels they identified as pair trawlers, and to verify the location and size of the fleet. They also used the technology to identify 3,000 smaller artisanal wooden vessels with dimmer lights, which are believed to be a North Korean fleet fishing in Russian waters in 2018.
Using a wide variety of tools allowed researchers to illuminate activities that were previously out of sight, gaining a better understanding of fishing vessels than has ever been done at this scale. Global Fishing Watch says the breakthrough could signal the start of new era in ocean management, one where it's easier to detect illegal fishing operations.
Dana Goward, president of the Resilient Navigation Foundation and a former maritime navigation authority for the US, points out that circumventing tracking isn't a new thing. "Almost as long as there has been GPS, folks have used it to track the activity of others, and others have found ways to defeat them. The problem with illegal fishing has been a particularly onerous one, especially because it allows vessels of one nation to essentially steal the resources of another," he says. "It's a long-standing problem."
Illegal fishing can make it difficult to manage fish stocks to get the most value out of them and to protect the ecosystem. "If you don't know how much you're catching, and you don't know who's catching what, there's no way for people to sit down at the table and agree on how to manage it," Kroosdma says.
South Korea sets a total allowable catch for squid, bans pair trawling, and permits fewer than 40 small trawlers. It also limits the lighting power of squid jiggers. But the likely Chinese fleet uses pair trawling, a greater number of vessels, and brighter lighting power to target the same stock. According to study coauthor Jungam Lee of the Korean Maritime Institute, competition from Chinese trawlers is likely forcing North Korean fishers—who use small wooden boats ill equipped for long-distance travel—into neighboring Russian waters.
The researchers estimated that the number of fishing days for these small vessels has increased from 39,000 in 2015 to 222,000 in 2018. The study states that about 3,000 North Korean vessels fished mostly illegally in Russian waters in 2018. This has led to North Korean boats washing ashore on Japanese coasts, in incidents that frequently involve starvation and death.
Since Pacific flying squid are found straddling the boundaries between South Korean, North Korean, Russian, and Japanese waters, Kroosdma says it's important for all countries to come to an agreement on how to manage the fish stock—and one way to do that is with transparency. "There's no way you're going to be managing that well without good information on how much people are catching," he says.
Reported catches have dropped by 80 percent in South Korean waters and 82 percent in Japanese waters since 2003. Researchers have continued to look at fishing activity since the study was completed. Fishing activity in 2019 was higher than 2018 but slightly lower than 2017, according to Kroosdma. Although the season peaks in September and October, they've already seen almost 450 Chinese pair trawlers in North Korean waters so far this year.
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