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Adam Curtis – Can't Get You Out of My Head
The first thing I want to say is, I love Adam Curtis, and I love his stuff, which is definitely Up My Street and My Kind of Thing. So it was a real pleasure to watch an episode of Can't Get You Out of My Head (BBC iPlayer) every evening for the past week. And if in the end I'm not entirely convinced, if I might consider that the emperor has no clothes, or that there's no there there, I still really enjoyed watching it, and found it thought provoking and stimulating.
(The second thing to say is, if you started following this blog in the past couple of weeks because you thought it was some kind of diet/health/keto blog: surprise!)
I want to begin, however, by blowing my own trumpet for perhaps longer than is quite decent. Here are the final two paragraphs of a post I wrote in November 2016:
There's a narrative out there. It's in the heart of Brexitland, it's in Le Pen's France, and it's in those Red States, of which there are increasing numbers. The narrative takes the undeniable evidence of people's blighted economic fortunes, ever-increasing burden of debt, lack of options, and it whispers (sometimes shouts) the blame. These people, with their alien religion, want to introduce their Sharia Law, here, in deepest Wisconsin. Or these other people, who want to stop the police from doing their job. Or these people who are stealing American jobs. Or these others, who want to take away your guns, or your freedom to say whatever the hell you want: all of them are collectively to blame for the shitty way you feel, for the way you feel uncomfortable, or embarrassed, for holding your opinions.
We can't help it: none of us are immune to the power of narrative. We're all just helpless robots, programmed to respond. The neoliberal consensus has been programming us all since the 70s, but since 2008 they've gradually lost control of the narrative. The banks were blatantly, obviously to blame for the financial crash. But the working classes were blatantly, obviously made to pay the cost. This injustice created a whirling, white-hot vortex of resentment and anger which made people receptive to the quiet comfort of an alternative narrative in which blame was apportioned. So people have followed their programming to its logical conclusion: first Brexit; and now Trump, the rampaging monster from America's id. Trump is the robot uprising, the one we're waiting for in Westworld.
That out of the way, here are my thoughts on Can't Get You Out of My Head.
If there's a thesis, it's pretty much standard Baudriallardan postmodernism: the Grand Narratives are dead, replaced with simulacra. Myth and illusion are the stock-in-trade of modern politicians; nobody believes in anything, and power and money are the only ends that people pursue. This is not to say that Curtis is simply rehashing mainstream thought, because these ideas about our world have always been too difficult and uncomfortable to become mainstream. But it is ironic, isn't it, that instead of grasping what was going on, people turned to made up stories and myths instead. And this is Curtis' subject.
He starts in lots of places and if he doesn't quite get all the strands to mesh, that's because taking different data points, seeing a pattern and putting them together and telling a story about them is the very problem he's identifying.
One of the starting points is Richard Hofstadter's essay "The Paranoid Style in American Politics", which in itself would probably take a 6-part documentary to explain. In short, there's a strand of American capitalism which is rooted in the idea that success and failure are Signs – of God's favour or its opposite. So even though everybody knows the aphorism that it's easier for a camel to to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God, American capitalism never saw a problem with accumulating wealth. But it's a short step from success and failure being Signs to everything being a sign, and pretty soon you're on the Hidden World Inside the World train and you don't believe anything you see. And so Americans in particular are susceptible to conspiracy theories (or "conspiracy reporting" as Merlin Mann joked in a recent Roderick on the Line episode).
So one of the threads that Curtis pulls at here is that conspiracy theories invented over 50 years ago in order to satirise the paranoid style in American politics (and life) are now straightforwardly believed by a lot of people — and not just Americans. In fact, conspiracy theories have become the dominant mode of public discourse, for left and right alike, to the point that the left lost its collective mind over Trump and Russia and Brexit and Cambridge Analytica and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all.
And the reason, according to Curtis, that people have turned to conspiracy theories is that people have stopped believing in collective action. This is a quite compelling idea, that people have forgotten the lesson of history (which is that social progress has only ever been made by collective action), and turned instead to an ideology of individualism and self-actualisation. So he brings in Maslow's hierarchy of needs and while he doesn't quite blame the Boomers, it's a remarkable coincidence that the end of collectivism coincided with the 1960s/1970s generation growing up to selfishly pursue their own ends and vote for Thatch/Reagan. The waters are muddy here, but at some point people turned away from Trade Unions and the idea of society.
And with individualism, argues Curtis, there can be no collectivism, and so it ultimately represents the death of a belief in democracy. Individualism seems seductive but leaves people feeling lonely and isolated, and in their isolation they turn to comforting narratives, which are not the grand narratives of collective action and social progress but nationalist myths and comforting conspiracies that lay the blame for their straightened economic circumstances at the door of Foreign Elements and Enemies Within.
Curtis jumps around in history a lot, it's part of the vibe. So we'll go from something fairly recent to FIFTY YEARS EARLIER, and he takes us back to the 1920s for the growth of nationalist myths about Folk traditions. And I think it's really interesting to link all those morris dancing Folk Societies with the growth of fascism and ultimately the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, the Middle East, and Make America Great Again. And it's always this vision of a mythical past that drives people like Trump and Radovan Karovic, Slobodan Milošević, Farage, Moseley, Hitler, and the rest. And the comforting pull of imperial measurements and the so-called Blitz Spirit has been blighting this country for years. Only this week, some twat writing for the Telegraph tappety-tapped some nonsense about Old Money being better for songs. Christ.
As well as jumping around in time, Curtis jumps around the world, from America to China, the Middle East, Europe, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and he looks at what certain corrupt politicians have in common, and questions the humanitarianism that drove interventions in the former Yugoslavia, Vietnam/Cambodia, and Iraq. He notes how, just as nationalist myths drive Brexit and Trump, the Maoist revolutionary narrative in China was co-opted by politicians seeking to hold onto power or to enrich themselves.
But the problem here, if we want to see it as a problem, is that Curtis' thesis about the death of grand narrative and the rise of conspiracy theories and pattern recognition relies very much on the latter process to hold it together. He discusses chaos and complexity theories and the rise of Big Data and links it to politicians giving up on The Vision Thing, and ceding control to technocrats and bankers. And he talks about how people started to use data points to predict human behaviour and how we all started mining data and recognising patterns that we built up into conspiracy theories. But did we? Did we all? Are we all guilty of this? I've got no patience with conspiracy theories, but I do have my own 'paranoid style' of pattern recognition, so I don't know.
In the end, this was a fascinating documentary series, full of Curtis' cheeky signature style of finding deeply weird video and film clips and linking them together with a seductive commentary and musical interludes. What he's best at perhaps, is mining cultural history for forgotten figures who are nevertheless deeply influential on the way we all think and believe today. The last episode even featured the pandemic and the power of memes to drive our emotions, which was a fascinating thread I'd like to see developed. And the series ended (as it perhaps had to?) with a message of hope, and a reminder that we once changed society using collective action and we might again, if we only started to believe. But narrative is a powerful thing, and I think that we've all got to work harder to resist the emotional manipulation to which we are all subject.
bastards, documentary, entertainment, Review, Television
Adam Curtis, iPlayer
3 responses to "Adam Curtis – Can't Get You Out of My Head"
18 February, 2021 at 7:13 am
I remember the other one about the Camel's nose.
Don't let the camel's nose into the tent, because if you do the camel's body will surely follow.
…and I was trying to figure out how to post Abbie Richard's Conspiracy chart. Instead here's a link to her interview for webworm (chart included!)
https://www.webworm.co/p/i-talk-to-the-creator-of-the-conspiracy
Thanks for the link – and the aphorism!


Australian's love their pets and we want to help you look after them properly. Find out everything you need to know about keeping your pet happy and safe.
There's no two ways about it, if your dog or cat is over 3 months old it needs to be registered, microchipped, and desexed - it's the law.
Lost your cat? Found a stray dog? Has your budgie flown the cage? Let us know and we'll help reunite the lost animal with his or her owner.
Nothing says fun like a dog frolicking free in the park. Let your pooch roam free at our network of off-leash dog parks.
Owning a dog comes with many responsibilities. If you own a dangerous dog you'll have to ensure your dog doesn't attack a member of the public. You can learn exactly what that means here.
Are you ducking swooping magpies? Blocking your ears from noisy dogs? Or did you see a snake? We have your back. Keep reading for information on how to deal with nuisance pets or wildlife problems.
Need to register a pet - all the forms you need are here in one place.
We have a no charge professional snake catching service to remove snakes from residential properties within Brimbank.


Here at The Log Shed we pride ourselves on providing our customers with the best quality product, giving outstanding service and helping with invaluable advice. We deliver 7 days a week. The Log Shed has been supplying the finest logs for over 10 years and has built a reputation built on first class products, trust and good old fashioned customer service.
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In your piece about the Open University (Jobs put at risk as Open University seeks £100m in savings, 14 June) you mention the impact of the introduction of tuition fees. In fact, OU students have always paid tuition fees and these increased, in line with inflation, for over 40 years.
The hammer blow came when the government forced the OU to triple fees in line with conventional universities. The sweetener offered in return was access to student loans. However, this did not work out because many did not qualify for these loans due to previous experience of higher education or a low course workload. Many who would have qualified were strongly averse to student debt. Student numbers dropped by a third almost overnight.
The vice chancellor is looking for salvation in the cloud. He would perhaps be better employed praying for a Jeremy Corbyn victory. Corbyn is pledged to abolishing tuition fees and that must include part-time students, mustn't it?
• The student loan system has always been deeply flawed. Not only is the basis economically unsound, but the cost of this graduate tax falls heavily on women because of the higher proportion of female to male undergraduates.
In addition, as you have recently shown (Report, 14 June), women face a pay gap just one year after graduating, and will, over a working lifetime, on average earn £300,000 less.
High-earning male graduates repay the loan quickly with minimum interest, while women graduates, struggling to balance work with family responsibilities, are adversely affected because interest accrues during career breaks. This disadvantage, in turn, impacts on the next generation.
• Your article (Young people have spoken: will their voice be heard over university fees and grants?, 13 June) includes a reminder from David Green that student loans are now increasing at a rate of around 6% a year, which over the 25 years a loan is paid back will result in a substantial increase in the cost of the loan, well in excess of the rate of inflation.
When student fees were first introduced the basis was that increases would be in line with inflation. The rules have changed and this additional burden is the price students will have to pay for the privatisation of student loans by the Conservative government. Another reminder that privatisation and Tory government do not work in the interests of the many.


Opioid addiction is on the rise so in an effort to curb this troubling trend, doctors are turning to digital pills.
The idea is to have prescription opioids comprised of radio transmitters which will be able to track patients' pill use in real time.
Often, patients are prescribed too many painkillers to begin with, which leads to them either taking more than they should over time or selling them to people who may already be addicted.
Ultimately, by equipping these digital pills with sensors, researchers from Harvard Medical School's Brigham and Women's Hospital hope to not only discourage abuse but get a better idea of the right number of pills to prescribe for specific injuries.
Chai hopes the digital pills will help spot problematic opioid use as soon as the behavior emerges in order to nip it in the bud.
The pills, which are not yet on the market, are made by a Florida-based company called eTectRx. Basically, they are gel capsules containing both the drug and a radio transmitter "about the size of a sesame seed," says Chai.
Stomach acid from the patient powers the digital pills, dissolving the gel capsules in order to release both the oxycodone tablet and the transmitter.
From here, the transmitter can send data to a patch stuck on the patient's belly, which is then capable of sending the data to the cloud for doctors and researchers to study.
One can venture to guess how the transmitter then exits a user's body but lets just say it is very natural.
All in all, these digital pills have the potential to put a real dent in the opioid addiction crisis which is sweeping many communities across the United States.


To RV enthusiasts Memorial Day signals the commencement of preparations for yet another summer adventure, a trip to an RV park. With so many RV parks sprinkled across the country, it provides an opportunity to enjoy the warm summer air while traversing this great Nation. Here are 5 reasons to try an RV park this summer.
RV parks present a much cheaper alternative to staying in a hotel. Even if you do not own an RV, the cost of renting one is significantly cheaper than residing in a hotel. Not only do you get a bargain by staying in an RV park, but the flora and fauna is refreshing, and the money saved could be used to appreciate other attractions in the region. Additionally, as there's no room service, you can be sure of no extra costs.
Seeing as it can be challenging to find an activity that the whole family enjoys, RV park grounds are usually located in the proximity of plenty of enjoyable destinations, suited to the varying tastes of each guest. Depending on the RV camp, activities could range from hunting, range shooting and mere exploration, to snorkeling, fishing and more. Whatever the recreational activity you enjoy, guaranteed there'll be something tailored to your needs.
Especially to those who reside in hectic, heavily polluted cities, an RV park provides a chance to unwind and appreciate the beauty of nature, while escaping the hustle and bustle of the city. You can set up a nice patio in a scenic part as well as catch and cook your own food. Not only can this have positive effects mentally, but physically as well.
RV parks are easily accessible, and provide a fun and pleasant environment where families can feel comfortable bringing their children. They make choosing a destination and settling in relatively easy. In fact, some RV parks provide RV vacation rentals to those park visitors that don't own RVs. This is cost effective as it isn't necessary to buy an RV just to use for the summer.
RV camping provides the ideal opportunity to bond with family and catch up with friends this summer, while also expanding your network and meeting new people. This is facilitated by the wide array of activities offered which are tailored to bring people together. An excellent way to re connect with people this summer.


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> David Barnes
www.davidbarnes.info
Welsh photographer David Barnes' (b.1974) long-term photography and film/ video practice has been exhibited and published internationally since 2001. He has been the recipient of numerous awards and commissions including major project production grants from the Arts Council of Wales in 2010 & 2013.
Collections of his work are held in private and public collections including the Visual Arts collection of the National Library of Wales, Ffotogallery and The Cynon Valley Museum and Gallery. He continues to develop and exhibit funded projects throughout the UK.
Barnes is a member of the European Centre for Photographic Research (University of South Wales, Newport, Wales).
Photographs 1998 - 2016
"Walls and fences are only hurdles. Trees re-make themselves in the waters at night-time and cats and dogs and foxes and swans are further reflections, in their singular ways. Tools both create and wreck, endlessly, always recurring. Where would we be without all these drugs ? Look what appears on the shore......."
Niall Griffiths - King Tide. 2012
David Barnes' photography and film/ video practice has been exhibited and published internationally since 2001. He has been a recipient of numerous awards and commissions including major project production grants from the Arts Council of Wales in 2010 & 2013. Collections of his work are held in private and public collections including the Visual Arts Collection of the National Library of Wales and The Ffotogallery. He continues to develop and exhibit funded projects throughout Europe. His latest exhibition in solution, on show at Ffotogallery's Turner House from 15 October – 3 December 2016, captures some of the particularities, and peculiarities, of South Wales' life. This new Ffotogallery commission, supported by the Arts Council of Wales and Caerphilly County Borough Council, reflects Barnes' work over the last four years. As a continuation of his long-term preoccupation with life and history in the region, in solution explores the competing forces that can shape social identity and cultural change.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Complete follow-up surveys one, two, and three years post 4Es program completion.
Interested elementary educators should submit applications no later than May 1, 2013.


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Whatever your needs, we appreciate the opportunity to work for you.


There has been a wave of Nineties nostalgia on the runways in Milan, with some designers throwing around the term "grunge" without fully remembering perhaps that the style and movement was actually anti-establishment and anti-fashion – at least until Marc Jacobs and Anna Sui got their hands on it.
The off-duty supermodel vibe of then was brought to the runway by a supermodel from now, Bella Hadid, who opened the show in a red crystal miniskirt with black lace hem, and crystal booties to match, topped with a super-soft oversized gray turtleneck sweater for the ultimate in accessible glam.
Long, bias-cut satin and silk slip dresses in hot pink or ivory were balanced with tuxedo tailoring in red or black, and sparking-sheer ruffled blouses with leather skirts, working the masculine-feminine trick. Serafini may also get the award for one of the glitziest iterations of the current craze, the boilersuit: covered in allover silver crystals, it was a party for all ages. And styling the collection with poiny-toe booties (rather than the clodhoppers we've seen on other runways) kept things from looking too vintage.
The ideas here weren't new, of course, but they were executed with enough fine polish to make the brand one of Milan's more solid options for a Nineties fix.


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AN NCS PREMIERE: XUL — "ORBIT OF NEMESIS" VIDEOGRAPHY: BEHEMOTH, NIGHTRAGE, SEPTICFLESH, PALLBEARER
INFERNO FESTIVAL 2015: DAY ONE
Concert Reviews Add comments
(Andy Synn reports on the first day of Oslo's Inferno Festival 2015 and provides photos. For Andy's report on the pre-fest show last Wednesday, go here.)
The first day of the festival proper began (for me at least) promptly at 6:15 when Spellemann Award-winning Death Metallers Execration took the stage.
Down and dirty, with a hint of something creepy just beneath the surface, the band's blending of rolling, Vader/Autopsy–style death-grooves, Behemoth/Watain-esque stomp and swagger, and touches of eerie, Morbid Angel-ish atmosphere – accentuated here and there by unexpected progressive touches, flashes of surprising technicality, and an undercurrent of lurching sludge – should, by all rights, be an awkward mix. Yet somehow they make it work, taking this amalgam of sounds and using it to whip up an absolute cacophony of ugly, unrepentant nastiness that's also as infectious as sonic syphilis.
Nipping downstairs to John Dee, I got my first exposure to Indian Death-Thrash types Inner Sanctum, whose chunky, belligerently heavy sound proved to be the perfect fit for the more intimate confines of the festival's second stage. With a sound akin to The Gathering-era Testament (which, by the way, is my favourite Testament album), they delivered a fast-paced and relentlessly fun set of rock-solid grooves and choppy riffs (splashing out with an occasional bluesy solo lick), that got the crowd pumped up and ready for action. I'll admit, it's a relatively familiar sound they're dealing in, but it's hard to care so much when it's delivered with this level of power and conviction.
Septic Flesh (it'll always be two words to me, dammit!) were up next on the main stage, and unfortunately offered up the night's one and only disappointment. The band's live set was dominated (perhaps unsurprisingly) by the pre-recorded orchestration and overpowering (and, truth be told, more than a little artificial) drum sound, with the guitars relegated mainly to background noise and a bass-tone that was practically non-existent. Indeed, band frontman Spiros Antoniou seemed far more interested in posing to show off his nifty necromonger outfit than, you know, actually playing his bass, and by halfway through the set his constant rock star preening was starting to get downright embarrassing.
It did seem a bit like I was in the minority though, as the crowd seemed to eat up their bland brand of Hammer Horror metal. Still, it left me absolutely cold, and reminded me of the musical equivalent of a Michael Bay cgi extravaganza – all style and no substance.
1349's latest album is called Massive Cauldron of Chaos and that's exactly what they delivered, a massive, boiling cauldron of pitch-black hatred that completely washed away any remaining sour taste left by their predecessors in waves of obsidian fire and fury. And I do mean fire, with some blazing pyrotechnics punctuating the aural hellfire with some more physical heat.
Oh, and did I mention that the band (accompanied by Destructhor of Myrkskog on second guitar) played the entirety of M.C.o.C. from start to finish to end their set?
The night's headliners, however, took things even further, with a set as grandiose and ostentatious as any you might come to mention, wreathed in smoke and flame. Of course, this pomp and pageantry would be meaningless without the songs to back it up. And boy, do Behemoth have the songs to back it up. Dropping in material from 1999's Satanica ("Decade of Therion"), Thelema 6 ("Christians to the Lions"), and many more ("As Above, So Below" from Zos KiaCultus being a personal favourite), into a set heavily focussed on recent masterpiece The Satanist, the quartet made damn sure to touch on all the aspects of their sound, with Nergal's seductive charisma and irrepressible energy making him both prophet and preacher to the assembled throng.
One thing though boys… I love "O Father, O Satan, O Sun" as much as the next guy… but close with "Lucifer" instead next time will you? It's just the perfect ender.
Posted by Islander at 9:00 am	Tagged with: 1349, Andy Synn, Behemoth, Execration, Inferno Festival, Inner Sanctum, Septicflesh
4 Responses to "INFERNO FESTIVAL 2015: DAY ONE"
Derek/Godless Angel says:
i'm jealous, this sounds awesome 🙂
Andy Synn says:
It WAS awesome. And still two more days to go!
RagE says:
Behemoth was awesome, but Satan, Satan, Satan then Confetti? really?
Satan IS fabulous


Sample Movie Treatment - Example Story Synopsis For A Film Script.pdf - Download as PDF File (.pdf), Text File (.txt) or read online.... Maze Runner: The Death Cure (also known simply as The Death Cure) is a 2018 American dystopian science fiction action film directed by Wes Ball and written by T.S. Nowlin, based on the novel The Death Cure written by James Dashner.
The Death Cure is the third novel in the maze runner trilogy by James Dashner. In this book, Thomas, a teenage boy, is one of the subjects in an experiment conducted …... The third instalment of the popular YA movie franchise has bagged a writer, as T.S. Nowlin will now pen The Maze Runner: The Death Cure.
The third instalment of the popular YA movie franchise has bagged a writer, as T.S. Nowlin will now pen The Maze Runner: The Death Cure. meg cabot abandon book 3 pdf The Trials are over. WICKED have collected all the information they can. Now it's up to the Gladers to complete the blueprint for the cure to the Flare with a final voluntary test.
Interview with the Maze Runner The Death Cure Cast!
'Maze Runner: The Death Cure' kicks off with our heroes in a heated train chase, in an effort to save their captured friend Minho (Ki Hong Lee) in the transport to The Last City.
Like its predecessor, The Death Cure lacks the freshness of the thrilling 2014 film, although it does feel like the teenage protagonists have matured in more than just appearance. They're still fighting for survival, but this time the fate of the world is at stake.
Maze Runner: The Death Cure (also known simply as The Death Cure) is a 2018 American dystopian science fiction action film directed by Wes Ball and written by T.S. Nowlin, based on the novel The Death Cure written by James Dashner.


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Q: Lisp IDE Portacle tells me "lisp connection closed unexpectedly connection broken by remote peer" So every time I try to run a code, it first gives me that message and then just "Not connected". How can I fix this?
There is a very similar question Getting started with SLIME and SWANK: Lisp connection closed unexpectedly: connection broken by remote peer but I'm using Portacle and as far as I know it should take care of stuff like slime.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Marcus Samuelsson's next restaurant opening? Harlem's restaurant row says NYT | HarlemGal Inc.
This entry was posted in 116th Street, Bars, business, celebrities, drinks, food, Frederick Douglass Blvd., Harlem, Harlem bloggers, Harlem blogs, Harlem businesses, Harlem Restaurant Row, Harlem restaurants, Harlem Tavern, HarlemGal, Red Rooster Harlem, restaurant row, restaurants, Silvana, Streetbird Rotisserie Harlem, Where to dine in Harlem and tagged Harlem, Harlem bloggers, Harlem Blogs, harlem restuarant row, Harlem Tavern, marcus samuelsson, Red Rooster Harlem, Silvana Harlem, Streetbird Rotisserie. Bookmark the permalink.
Why has this one Avenue become so completely oversaturated with restaurants while Lower Lenox is starving for decent regular places to eat… not like the shi shi Cheri with some Haute Table or whatever overpriced nonsense that is… Hell, even East Harlem is getting a Thai restaurant… What the hell is going on with Lower Lenox?


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Press Center News 2017 VFX Veteran Jim Rygiel Joins FuseFX
VFX Veteran Jim Rygiel Joins FuseFX
LOS ANGELES — Visual effects studio FuseFX has appointed Jim Rygiel executive visual effects supervisor. He is a three-time Academy Award-winning visual effects supervisor who has supervised a wide range of tent pole features, including The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Godzilla, Spiderman (2011), and Night at the Museum, among others. Prior to his tenure as an independent supervisor, he helped found Boss Films Digital, one of the original and iconic visual effects facilities in Los Angeles.
"We are incredibly excited to have Jim join our team," says David Altenau, co-founder and CEO of FuseFX. "He's a legend in this industry and adds an elite level of expertise and experience to our growing studio. His leadership of our supervision team will compliment the depth of our existing talent and allow us to expand our role in providing the best visual effects for episodic television, feature films and beyond."
"I have worked with many high-end facilities and the FuseFX team is on par and in some cases exceeds the pipelines and creative environments of the larger post houses," says Rygiel. "I'm thrilled to play a part in the future of this dynamic company."
Rygiel is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Directors Guild of America, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and others.
Digital Film Technology appoints Managing Director Gunter Weidlich
The board of Prasad Corp. has appointed Gunter Weidlich as managing director for Digital Film Technology (DFT) . Prasad Corp, is a world leader in film preservation, digitization, and restoration, and ...
Epic Games hails "The Voice in the Hollow" a "Masterpiece of Real-Time Animation"
Miguel Ortega and Tran Ma accomplished the unimaginable by creating an animated African horror fable that leverages the power of Epic Games' Unreal Engine.
Chaos releases V-Ray 6 for Cinema 4D
Seamless decals, beautiful clouds and other production-ready features now available in artist-friendly renderer Today, Chaos ( chaos.com ) launches V-Ray 6 for Cinema 4D, expanding artistic control on ...


Just Ducky: My first real bread!
Bought a cast iron Dutch Oven last weekend. Though it came factory seasoned, it's spent the last week on my woodstove as I'd periodically apply more peanut oil to season it more thoroughly.
Mix in 1-1/4 cup water.
Bake 30 minutes covered, 15 minutes uncovered.
The bottom burned, but the rest came out really good. One of the folks on Facebook said it was missing a glass of milk and some honey...gonna have to try that next time because that would've gone so well with the fresh bread for breakfast!
I think next time I'll take it off the woodstove at the 30 minute mark and leave to bake in the Dutch Oven on a pad. Or if I can find a trivet (wonder how long it would take Pam to notice one missing from her kitchen decorations...), once the Dutch Oven is hot, right before I throw in the dough put the trivet under it on the woodstove.
I'm figuring it used 60 cents of flour (3 cups of King Arthur bread flour @ $3.79/5#, about 4 cups to the pound), and maybe 5 cents of yeast and flour.


On Saturday, Feb. 8, 23-year-old Diane Elsroth died after taking two Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules laced with potassium cyanide. The pills had been purchased at an A.&P. store in Bronxville, N.Y. An investigation was begun involving two local law-enforcement agencies, the Federal Food and Drug Administration and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Four days later, Federal workers checking bottles of Tylenol capsules confiscated or turned in from stores in Westchester County discovered more tainted pills, this time in a bottle that had been on a shelf in a F. W. Woolworth store in Bronxville, a block from the A.&P.
Authorities have said they have no suspects. The case echoed events in 1982, when seven people in the Chicago area died after taking Tylenol capsules that were also adulterated with potassium cyanide.
Q. Where is Tylenol made?
A. The drug is manufactured by the McNeil Consumer Products Company, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson. McNeil has three plants - in Fort Washington, Pa., near Philadelphia; Dorado, P.R., and Round Rock, Tex., near Austin. The company has said the two bottles of tainted capsules came from different lots - ADF 916, made at Fort Washington, and AHA 090, made in Puerto Rico. Both lots were shipped to retailers from the same company distribution center in Montgomeryville, Pa., near Philadelphia.
Q. Where did the tampering take place?
A. This is the central question in the case. Right now, no one can say for sure, but there are several theories.
Q. Could the pills have been tampered with at the factory?
A. Probably, but officials of Johnson & Johnson and the F.D.A. say it is unlikely. The two bottles, they note, came from different lots produced in different places a thousand miles apart. The bottles, one from Puerto Rico and one from Fort Washington, ended up in stores within a block of each other and they appeared at these two locations within two weeks of each other.
To accomplish this unusual confluence of time and place, a person would have had to know where the lots were going and when they would arrive. In short, these officials say, someone would have had an extremely difficult time orchestrating events so that the two bottles ended up in Bronxville.
Officials say the potassium cyanide in both bottles of the tainted pills had the same chemical profile. This means, they believe, that someone would have to have poisoned two different batches of pills at two widely separated plants with the same batch of poison.
Q. Does it appear that someone bought or took the pills out of the stores, laced them with the poison, then returned them to the shelves?
Tylenol capsules such that it is impossible to open the package and then reseal it?
A. Difficult but not impossible. Packaging experts say the seals - adhesive on the outer carton, a plastic band heat-shrunk to the cap, and a foil seal laminated to the bottle lip, inside the cap -are tamper-resistant but not tamperproof. This means someone with the will, equipment and knowledge could open the bottles, fill the capsules with poison and reseal the packages.
Q. Is there any evidence that the seals on the two containers were tampered with?
A. No, not from what Federal and local officials have said. And this brings the case back to the factory, at least in the opinion of Carl A. Vergari, the Westchester County District Attorney, who is involved in investigating Miss Elsroth's death. He has said the F.B.I. told him that its investigators believed the seals on both bottles had not been tampered with. Thus, he says, he is inclined to believe the tampering occurred at the plant.
Q. Has anyone ruled out the possibility of tampering at the distribution center in Montgomeryville?
A. No, but officials say the bottles of Tylenol capsules are packed in cartons that have two other safety seals, to try to thwart tampering.
Q. Did they ever catch the culprit from the Chicago case in 1982?
A. No. That case is still open and records from it have been shipped to Yonkers to help New York authorities.
Q. Are there any similarities between the Chicago area deaths and the current case?
A. None of the officials involved will answer this question, other than to say that the potassium cyanide used to taint the capsules in 1982 had a different chemical makeup from the potassium cyanide discovered in the capsules last week. However, this does not mean that someone different is at work now. Whoever it is could be using potassium cyanide obtained from a different source.
Q. Where do you get potassium cyanide and what is it used for?
A. It is sold by chemical-supply companies. It is used in electroplating, the extraction of silver and gold from their ores, in the fumigation business and to recover silver from solutions of photgraphic fluid. It is sold as a white powder and is relatively easy to obtain.
Q. Is any cyanide kept at the plants where Tylenol is made and what do they use it for?
A. Cyanide is kept at the plants, but it is not the same composition as the poison found in the pills and it is strictly controlled. It is used as a standard to test the purity of two of the raw materials that go into the production of Tylenol - magnesium sterate and povidone. When technicians assay, or test, these materials with cyanide, they can determine if they are free of lead.
Q. Are other over-the-counter remedies, like liquids and pills, susceptible to tampering?
A. Yes, but tablets crumble and might discolor if they are dipped in a poison solution. Capsules come in two parts and can easily be separated and put back together.
Q. Are over-the-counter remedies supposed to be safety-sealed?
A. Yes. A Federal law passed after the deaths in the Chicago area in 1982 requires that all over-the-counter drugs have a least one tamper-resistant seal either on the package or the container.
Q. What are the unanswered questions in the case?
A. The main questions are these: Where were the pills tampered with -at the manufacturing site, when they arrived in Westchester County or somewhere in between? What is the motive for such an act - a disgruntled employee, a profiteer playing the stock market, a psychotic killer trying to bend the world to his will - the range is endless, officials say.
Is the same person who poisoned the capsules in 1982 at work now or is it a ''copycat'' killer? What can be done to foil another attempt - banning the sale of all medicine in capsules and removing from the market anything, like liquids, that can be tampered with?


After the projection of the film "Memphis Belle", a conference and debate will be organized. American, English, German and French ace pilots will gather their souvenirs of operations in the skies of Alsace and will answer all questions asked .
Pierre SIMARD – Fighter pilot in the Fighter Group 1/7 Provence operating on Spitfire MK IX. Lieutenant SIMARD lands on the Haguenau airfield on the 25 th december 1944 and must leave in emergency on the 31 st december during the german counter-attack in the North of Alsace.
Henry BALLEREAU – Fighter pilot in the Group 2/3 Dauphiné operating P47 Thunderbolt .
Gerhard HILDENBRAND – Pilot on D 520 in the J/G 101 on jet fighter Me 262 on which he accomplishes 8 war missions.
Hans-Ekkehard BOB – Pilot in the 3/JG 21 in July 1939, then in the famous JV 44 with A. Galland, operating jet fighters Me 262, over 700 war missions.
Jean DABOS – Spitfire pilot in England from early 1944 in the Squadron 341 Alsace in the Air Force of the "France Libre".
Jimmy DAVIES – Fighter pilot in the Royal Air Force. Flies on Spitfire in England from early 1944 in the Squadron 341 Alsace in the Air Force of the "France Libre".
Roger GUILLAUME - Fighter pilot in the G/C 2/5 Lafayette Squadron .
Joseph STELHIN– Gunfighter-mechanics in the Bomber's groupe 1/32 Bourgogne .


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Reeth Memorial Hall
Regular users
Reeth Parish Council
Swaledale & Arkengarthdale Archaeology Group
Reeth Artyfacts
Music archive >
Fireworks >
Other events coming soon
Reeth Brass Band
The band rehearse weekly in the Memorial Hall on Tuesday evenings. They perform regularly in the dales and further afield, including regular Sunday afternoon concerts on the village green during the summer months and at the village Carol Service around the Christmas Tree on the last Sunday evening before Christmas.
Reeth Brass Band on the village green. See their website for the timetable of Sunday afternoon performances during the summer months.
Luncheon Club
Meets on the second Wednesday of each month. Membership is free and open to all living in the two Dales. A three course lunch is prepared at a cost of £8 per head. Menus are available at Reeth Post Office or the Gift Shop.
Legs, Bums & Tums
Legs, Bums & Tums is a weekly session run by Allen Meffen, a level 3 advanced fitness instructor and personal trainer, lifestyle/nutrition advisor, and group fitness instructor. Contact 07969-167261 or see the Facebook page.
Swaledale Seedlings hold sessions from 9.30am to 11.25am on Mondays and Thursdays in the Memorial Hall, catering for children from birth to four years. Sessions cost £1 for under ones; £2 for one to two years; £4 for two and over.  For enquiries please see their Facebook page.
A gentle chair based exercise to music class to improve strength, flexibility, balance and co-ordination, for older people or those of any age with a disability runs in the Memorial Hall on Tuesday from 1.30pm to 2.30pm. The first class is free, subsequent classes are £4 per session. No need to book, just turn up on the day. Call Charlotte on 07950 927151 for more information.
The Swale Singers
The Swale Singers use Reeth Memorial Hall as our regular rehearsal venue. We are a choir of some 40 members mostly from Swaledale and Wensleydale, who meet regularly to make music and rehearse for concerts, often for charitable causes, and also for the Swaledale Festival. We welcome all comers, whether you are already a seasoned singer, or you're looking to make a comeback to a choir, or you are new to the Dales (a good way to make about forty new friends) or you just fancy having a good sing for a couple of hours most weeks. Do join us and our musical director, Peter Stallworthy, every Sunday afternoon from 3 – 5pm. We hope you would get as much pleasure as we do from singing together.
This term we are rehearsing Faure's Requiem and Durufle's Requiem for our Festival concert, and we shall be starting on February 2nd.
Do get in touch if you would like to come along and see if you like us. Email: swalesingers@swaledale.org


Tests of up to 500mph (800km/h) were previously planned for autumn 2018, but two important suppliers went into receivership before completing their work for the project.
They are now in a period of intense planning so can not release specifics of what the above development means but they hope to be able to in the near future.
"In light of this, but with the very real prospect that our ability to raise funds is about to be transformed, the team has re-evaluated plans for running the auto". The opportunity now exists to reduce the time delay between conducting the high-speed tests (known as "BH500") and the first record attempt.
After more than a decade of intensive planning, the auto will be flown to Northern Cape in South Africa next May for high-speed tests, ahead of plans for it to pass 1,000mph (1,609km/h) later in the year.
The upside of the postponement is that (should everything go to plan) there will be no need to bring the auto back to the United Kingdom after its second test - meaning an assault on the 763.065mph land speed record could potentially occur in October or November of the same year.
It has been the expectation that the Bloodhound supersonic vehicle would travel to South Africa, where the record attempt will take place, later this year.
The auto - 13.4 m long, 7.5 t - will remain in South Africa between events.
It'll be ten years this October since the team behind Bloodhound SSC announced their intention to build a "car" capable of matching or exceeding 1000mph. The Project is followed in over 220 countries and territories.
The World Land Speed Record of 763mph (1,228km/h) is now held by Thrust SSC, a United Kingdom team led by Noble and driven by Andy Green.


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National Blue Ribbon
St. Vincent de Paul Catholic School was named a 2016 and a 2022
National Blue Ribbon School.
The National Blue Ribbon award is a tribute to St. Vincent de Paul Catholic School and its pursuit of academic excellence. Schools who exemplify the best in education, and possess high levels of student achievement are selected to receive the National Blue Ribbon award.
Schools are eligible to apply for this award every five years and St. Vincent's is proud to have received consecutive awards for excellence.


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Q: Do I need to close the OS-level handle returned to me by tempfile.mkstemp if not using it? I need to create a temporary file to write some data out to in Python 3. The file will be written to via a separate module which deals with opening the file from a path given as a string.
I'm using tempfile.mkstemp() to create this temporary file and according to the docs:

mkstemp() returns a tuple containing an OS-level handle to an open file (as would be returned by os.open()) and the absolute pathname of that file, in that order.

Given I'm not going to be using the open OS-level file handle given to me, do I need to close it? I understand about regular Python file handles and closing them but I'm not familiar with OS-level file descriptors/handles.
So is this better:
fd, filename = tempfile.mkstemp()
os.close(fd)

Or can I simply just do this:
_, output_filename = tempfile.mkstemp()

A: The returned file descriptor is not a file object, the garbage collector will not close it for you.
You should use:
fd, filename = tempfile.mkstemp()
os.close(fd)

The returned file descriptor is useful to avoid race conditions where the filename is replaced with a symbolic link to a file that the attacker can not read but you can which can result in data exposure.


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2019 US Open Cup Round 2: Colorado Springs Switchbacks earn home win vs. FC Denver … again
Posted by Jason Smith | May 17, 2019
Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC midfielder Kwasi Donsu (20) celebrates with teammates after his goal in the first half against FC Denver in the second round of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup at Weidner Field. Credit: Isaiah J. Downing/Switchbacks FC
The host Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC (USL-C) defeated FC Denver (USASA) 1-0 in Round 2 of the 2019 Lamar Hunt US Open Cup. This was the second year in a row the two sides have met in the Open Cup, with the Switchbacks pulling out a 3-2 victory in 2018.
The scoring chances came early with a flourish of opportunities by both sides turned away by goalkeepers on both sides. FC Denver keeper Jacob Peterson made several saves, including a point blank stop on a Mike Seth shot in the 14th minute, and a Matt Hundley blast in the 39th minute. His counterpart in the net for Colorado Springs, 16-year-old Abraham Rodriguez, was equal to the task making several spectacular saves, including turning away a Peter Jacobson shot in a seemingly wide open net in the 25th minute.
Last year it was 3-2, this year it's 1-0 as @cospringsfc (USLC) eliminate @FC_Denver (USASA) two years straight in #USOC2019 pic.twitter.com/s01mM8JKNh
— U.S. Open Cup (@opencup) May 16, 2019
"I was just doing my job. I was trying to keep the team in the game and saves like that help give us the win." Rodriguez said.
The deadlock was finally broke in the 45th minute as Kwansi Donsu struck a shot from 30 yards out to open the scoring for the Switchbacks.
"First of all, I want to thank God and our supporters. They always support us. It was a good game for me because it was my first goal for the Switchbacks," Donsu said. "I'm very happy I scored a goal and we won."
In the second half, FC Denver attempted to push the play but could not solve the Switchbacks defense. The first half-goal proved to be the game winner and push Colorado Springs on to the Round 3, facing New Mexico United.


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Retail advisors understand the needs and challenges of today's competitive fuel market. They will work with you to develop the fuel package that best suits your needs.
So call us today on 01925 858 528 to discuss your site.


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The TritonWear Blog
How to Swim Faster
Perfect Your Freestyle
Building a Winning Team
Shop Triton 2
Race Analysis: Women's 100M Free Final Rio Olympic Games
By Swim Swam
TritonWear and Swim Swam bring you the best in swimming race analysis. With the power of TritonWear, you can have an in-depth analysis of your practice every day with zero effort. Today we are having a closer look of once-in-a-lifetime race of 2016 Rio Olympic Games.
The women's 100m freestyle final at the 2016 Olympics was slated to be one of the most exciting races of the competition. It was entirely possible that the gold and silver medals could be claimed by sisters Cate Campbell and Bronte Campbell of Australia. Bronte had a pair of World Championship titles from the year before and Cate had just broken the 100 Freestyle world record heading into Rio. Speculation was rampant about who might take the Olympic title. But although the women's 100 freestyle did turn into an epic showdown, it wasn't at all as predicted.
Cate rocketed into the lead on the first length with incredible efficiency. Taking only 30 strokes, she flipped under world record pace in a blistering 24.77. Her stroke index value was 5.36, far exceeding that of every other swimmer in the race. Meanwhile, Bronte was only a few tenths of a second behind – it looked as though the Australian sprint sisters were indeed in a position to take the top two spots on the podium.
But other competitors began to move up in the back half of the race. Simone Manuel of the United States had the fastest turn in the pool by far, clocking in at 0.55 seconds. She used her momentum off the wall to surge into a long, powerful stroke – the only swimmer to increase her DPS on the second length. Sarah Sjostrom of Sweden also blasted off the turn to propel herself into striking distance of the leaders. She maintained a relatively high rate of 1.2 seconds per stroke that helped her close the gap.
With 15 meters to go, the field was nearly even. The Campbell sisters struggled to maintain their lead while Manuel and Sjostrom battled for an edge. But suddenly a new challenger entered the mix: Penny Oleksiak, the young breakout star from Canada. Nobody saw her coming – she'd split a full second slower than Cate Campbell on the opening 50 and was stuck back in seventh place. But Penny had been saving her energy to shift into a higher gear, hitting top speed in the pool at 1.85 m/s on the second length. Her powerful kick thrust her into medal contention as the swimmers neared the finish.
Manuel and Oleksiak broke into a slight lead in the final few meters and fought stroke-for-stroke into the wall. Spectators held their breath as they reached in synchronization and slammed the touchpad together to tie for gold in an Olympic record time of 52.70. Sjostrom got her hand on the wall next to claim the bronze in 52.99, shutting out both of the Campbell sisters.
The come-from-behind finish from two underdogs, resulting in a closely contested race that was exciting through the final stroke, made this race one of the most epic showdowns of the Rio Olympics.
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CNB Council reduces the required reserve ratio
Published: 28/5/1998
The Council of the Croatian National Bank decided to reduce the required reserve ratio by 2.35 percentage points, that is from 31.85 to 29.5 percent, starting from May 29, 1998. This decision was made by the Council of the Croatian National Bank chaired by Governor Dr. Marko Škreb at its meeting on Wednesday, May 27, 1998. The Croatian central bank has previously announced a reduction of the required reserve ratio. This decision is consistent with the monetary policy trend of the past two years in which the required reserve ratio was gradually but significantly reduced. The Council passed the decision at this time because of the following reasons:
As it has in the past years, in anticipation of the tourist season, the central bank must introduce measures to ensure increased liquidity in the financial system which will enable business entities, primarily exchange offices, to perform exchange operations without difficulties. Furthermore, having reviewed developments in liquidity in the financial system as a whole, the Council concluded that the effects of the value added tax and other tax revenues have resulted in higher liquidity of the government budget, which has led to increased liquidity oscillations in the banking system. The Council expects the oscillations to be overcome by the freeing of funds through the reduction of the reserve ratio.
The Council of the Croatian National Bank also believes that this measure will enable the reduction in interest rates.


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Fringe - The Complete Series 1-5 [Blu-ray]
Actors: Anna Torv, Joshua Jackson, Lance Reddick
Format: PAL, Subtitled
Run Time: 3943 minutes
All five seasons of the sci-fi television drama, co-created by J.J. Abrams, following a team investigating cases of strange phenomena that exist on the fringes of science. FBI agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) suspects a sinister presence behind bizarre and unexplained events and enlists the help of a scientist who has been in a mental institution for the last 17 years, Walter Bishop (John Noble), along with his son, Peter (Joshua Jackson). Together, they explore various cases which go beyond the realms of normal police work and soon begin to uncover a trail leading to a global corporation called Massive Dynamic.


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Resources > Latest News > Nsw water quality under threat from loosened water pollution laws
NSW water quality under threat from loosened water pollution laws
Oct 25, 2017 | 1 mins read by Water Source
The NSW Government's recent amendments on water pollution laws could have vast implications for Sydney's drinking water catchments, with mines being waived of their responsibility to ensure their impact is 'neutral or beneficial' to surrounding environments.
Earlier this month, the NSW Government moved to amend legislation in order to nullify a court decision against the extension of the Springvale coal mine.
The amended legislation validates the approval of Springvale's development consent, but it also changes the water quality test that is applied to extensions of existing developments; the change requires that extensions don't pollute the drinking water any more than the original development did prior to the extension.
4Nature President Andrew Cox told the Guardian that the legislative amendments will lock in weaker pollution regulations, the likes of which have not been followed for decades.
"It provides an infinite pollution holiday. Existing pollution levels will be grandfathered," Cox said.
NSW Labor spokesman for industry, resources and energy Adam Searle said Labor would oppose that part of the bill and would move an amendment to it.
"It's not desirable and we oppose it because we think there should be a higher standard of protection," Searle said.
While Labor will support the extension of the Springvale mine, the amendment allowing for continued water pollution was described by Searle as "unnecessary and potentially dangerous".
The Greens energy spokesman Jeremy Buckingham said the legislation will penalise cleaner development in favour of extensions to older developments.
"A perverse outcome of the legislation is that it will penalise new environmentally sensitive development over older, more polluting developments. New developments will be held to a much higher standard than the extension of existing developments," Buckingham said.
And while the legislation amendments were rushed in an attempt to stabilise the energy market in light of the recent Court of Appeal decision to bar the Springvale mine extension, Buckingham said the energy supply problem was being used as a ruse to weaken environmental protections.
"The Berejiklian Government is using the confected crisis of Mt Piper's coal supply to sneak through laws that gut protections for the quality of Sydney's drinking water supply," he said.
"The legislation goes far beyond the Springvale coal mine and allows any extensions to existing developments in the whole Sydney drinking water catchment to avoid the 'neutral or beneficial' test designed to improve the quality of Sydney's drinking water.
"It freezes in time poor levels of water pollution control at the expense of Sydney's drinking water quality."
Pollution Mining Government NSW Drinking Water Contamination Natural Environment Water Quality Policy
NSW Government invests $130M towards water treatment expansion
With Sydney's north-west set to expand by 29,000 residential dwellings, the NSW Government has announced plans to invest $130… Read Full Paper
Hunter Water develops plans to ensure region's long-term water security
Faced with a growing population and an uncertain climatic future, Hunter Water is working on a major review of the Lower Hunter… Read Full Paper
Havelock North Drinking Water Inquiry stresses on major water reform
The NZ Government has come under pressure to implement major regulatory reforms for the guaranteed safety of drinking water… Read Full Paper


Start at 10.15, until lunch.
After most lectures you'll receive an assignment that contains one or more questions. Work on the assignment in groups of two persons. Document the answers on your personal webpage. Please don't forget to mention your team mate's name.
Starting after lunch, until 16.00.
Starting at 10.15, until 16.00.
What's new / special about your subject?
Which activities are you planning to do (approach)?
Who is doing what in your team?
What resources do you need (connectivity, hardware, …)?
Ethical and privacy considerations. If personal information of third parties can (accidentally) be accessed during your project: add a procedures like deletion of project data and responsible disclosure. Also ALWAYS notify Jeroen in case of unforeseen circumstances that are not described in your project proposal.
Have you already got some great ideas before the deadline? Please contact Jeroen, the sooner the better!
Come back soon, subjects will be added here during the course.
Proper documentation of the lab assignments must be available on your personal webpage in folder ot, if not no grade!
Eavesdropping with an optical microphone (laser).
Testing current good practices for wiping Android devices and improve weak points.
Extracting valuable data from dead Android devices.
Eavesdropping on and decrypting of GSM communication using readily available low-cost hardware and free open-source software in practice.
Implementing Mimikatz compatible output options (MS crash dump) in DMA physical memory dump tools (e.g. Inception).
Identity how wide-spread clickjacking is (by checking missing counter measures) and implement an advanced example to show the impact of such an attack.
Development BadUSB-alike attacks for the USB Armory.
Shedding a light on publicly known TEMPEST attacks.
Canon EOS 6D security evaluation.
Reviewing the procedures of Port Knocking.
Heartbleed: how widespread is it?


What are the logics of pricing, and why do some pricing schemes defy standard economic expectations? What explains the different labor market outcomes of people who receive the same training from the same place and who have similar grades? Why do national governments issue statements about the country's history and personality when developing economic policies, and why are struggles over the images pictured on money so hard fought?
This engaging book locates the answers to these and other questions in the cultural logics and dynamics that constitute and guide markets. Using clear prose and illustrative examples, Frederick F. Wherry demystifies what culture is, and how it can be identified both in the way that markets are organized and in the way that people operate within them.
The Culture of Markets offers a comprehensive introduction to the puzzles found in studies of markets and to the ways that cultural analyses address those puzzles. The clarity of the arguments will make this a welcome resource for upper-level students of cultural sociology, economic sociology, and business/marketing.


This area tells the story of the Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyel, who founded the first centralised Bhutanese state in the 17th century.
In 1616 the cleric Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyel (1594-1651) had to flee from Tibet. At the time Bhutan was split up into small principalities which were largely independent. Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyel united the autonomous principalities for the first time into a theocratic state. Due to his skilful policy of alliances, his charisma as a lama, but also because of his supreme military strategy he gained unrestricted power. Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyel incorporated one region after the other into a realm administrated in writing and laid the foundations for the creation of the Bhutanese society. Many of the things created by Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyel still determine the national identity of the Bhutanese. He created a legal system which ruled the lives of all the people of Bhutan and which was still in effect until the recent past. Monastic rituals dating back to the founder of the state still protect the country to this very day. His tutelary deity Mahakala is also the tutelary of the modern monarchy. The Drukpa Kagyupa school of Buddhism which he belonged to is the state religion. After his death in 1651 he returned in many reincarnations. Nevertheless soon after his death the country lacked a charismatic personality at its helm. Many regional leaders reached for central power and the country was ravaged by civil wars.


Good management and leadership will help companies thrive amid changes in the way business is conducted in the 21st century, according to William Buist.
The chief executive of business consultancy firm Abelard and founder of xTEN Club programme said that the structure of business has changed over the years. There is now a greater focus on globalisation, speed and efficiency, while personalised services are harder to come by.
Mr Buist listed four essential skills to run a successful business in the modern era.
The first was to inspire engagement, which requires business bosses to display to their employees, customers and shareholders such qualities as honesty, integrity, insight and courage.
Furthermore: "Employees need to be presented with opportunities to be creative and have their thoughts and opinions truly heard.
Mr Buist added that social media needed to be monitored and responded to quickly.
The next skill required company heads to make prompt operational decisions more decisively, prioritising what is most important both for the immediate needs of the business and society, Mr Buist said.
The third necessitated the need for bosses to be present in some capacity nearly all the time – although, with virtual options, being 'chained' to the desk was not only unnecessary but also not cost-effective for most businesses.
The last step was to help employees be more effective. Mr Buist deemed public speaking skills essential, while the ability for workers to be able to manage difficult situations by themselves was also vital.
He said: "Employees need to present a positive image of the company, internally and externally.
"Employees are presented with opportunities to help one another do their best by exercising good teamwork skills. Having a sense of when to talk and when to listen is an invaluable skill.


Need a local plumber or heating engineer in North yorkshire? We may be able to help, we no longer cover this area ourselves, but we do work with a number of local plumbing and heating partners, who will be more than happy to help!
It doesn't matter if you require an emergency plumbing repair, a central heating installation, a sink unblocking or boiler repair, our plumbing partners in North yorkshire can help.
To contact us, simply fill in the contact form below and member of the Heating and Plumbing Central team will be in touch.


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25 days in Europe Itinerary
Created using Inspirock Europe sightseeing planner
Start: Salt Lake City, United States
Salt Lake City (SLC) — Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS)
5169 miles / 17h 45min
Salt Lake City (SLC) — Brussels (BRU)
Fastest: 12h 15min
5081 miles / 18h
Salt Lake City — Pocatello
Pocatello — Pocatello (PIH)
Pocatello (PIH) — Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS)
Amsterdam Schiphol (AMS) — Copenhagen (CPH)
Brussels (BRU) — Copenhagen (CPH)
1h 30min non-stop
Nyborg, Denmark
Drive + Fly: 8h
Nyborg — Copenhagen Kastrup Airport (CPH)
Copenhagen Kastrup Airport (CPH) — Aalborg Airport (AAL)
Fastest: 46min
130 miles / 4h 1min
Aalborg Airport (AAL) — Kristiansand Airport (KRS)
Fastest: 10h 45min(flight time: 7h)
Kristiansand (KRS) — Oslo (OSL)
Fastest: 3h 30min(flight time: 46min)
3h 30min non-stop(flight time: 46min)
Oslo (OSL) — Pulkovo (LED)
7h 30min via ARN(flight time: 4h)
Oslo (OSL) — Helsinki (HEL)
Helsinki (HEL) — St. Petersburg
Pulkovo (LED) — Rome (FCO)
Pulkovo (LED) — Naples (NAP)
5h 45min via DME
Naples (NAP) — Napoli Centrale
3 miles / 15min
Napoli Centrale — Rome
Rome (FCO) — Barcelona (BCN)
Rome — Napoli Centrale
Napoli Centrale — Naples (NAP)
Naples (NAP) — Barcelona (BCN)
Barcelona (BCN) — Salt Lake City (SLC)
Fastest: 16h 45min(flight time: 13h 45min)
Barcelona — Toulouse Matabiau
Toulouse Matabiau — Jeanne d'Arc
Jeanne d'Arc — Toulouse (TLS)
Toulouse (TLS) — Salt Lake City (SLC)
Fastest: 13h
Barcelona — Girona (GRO)
Girona (GRO) — Salt Lake City (SLC)
End: Salt Lake City, United States
Destinations in Europe
Things to do in Europe
Your list of things to see and do now includes Emperor's Canal (Keizersgracht), Royal Palace Amsterdam, Singel, and other attractions. There's lots more to do: admire the masterpieces at Van Gogh Museum, make a trip to Anne Frank House, hunt for treasures at Albert Cuyp Market, and steep yourself in history at Museum Het Rembrandthuis (Rembrandt House).
To see ratings and more tourist information, you can read our Amsterdam tour itinerary planner .
Salt Lake City, USA to Amsterdam is an approximately 12.5-hour flight. You can also do a combination of flight and train; or do a combination of bus and flight. You'll lose 8 hours traveling from Salt Lake City to Amsterdam due to the time zone difference. While traveling from Salt Lake City, expect slightly colder days and about the same nights in Amsterdam, ranging from highs of 56°F to lows of 40°F. You'll have a few hours on the 24th (Fri) to wrap things up before traveling to Copenhagen.
Parks Outdoors Museums
Find places to stay Apr 21 — 24:
2:00pm, Thu Apr 23
12:30pm, Wed Apr 22
9:00am, Wed Apr 22
City of Beautiful Towers
Founded in the 10th century as a Viking fishing village, Copenhagen has morphed into the cultural, political, and economic powerhouse of the country.
You've added Amalienborg, Changing of her Majesty's guard at Amalienborg Castle, Frederiksborg Castle, and other attractions to your itinerary. There's lots more to do: step into the grandiose world of Rosenborg Castle, make a trip to The Little Mermaid, get to know the fascinating history of Nyhavn, and visit Stroeget.
To find traveler tips, other places to visit, maps, and other tourist information, read our Copenhagen journey planner.
Traveling by flight from Amsterdam to Copenhagen takes 4.5 hours. Alternatively, you can do a combination of train and flight; or drive. Expect a daytime high around 52°F in April, and nighttime lows around 38°F. Finish up your sightseeing early on the 26th (Sun) so you can travel to Nyborg.
Things to do in Copenhagen
Historic Sites Neighborhoods Museums
Frederiksborg Castle
4:30pm, Fri Apr 24
10:00am, Sat Apr 25
Stroeget
Nyborg is a city in central Denmark, located in Nyborg Municipality on the island of Funen and with a population of 16,528 (as of 1 January 2014). To see other places to visit, traveler tips, where to stay, and more tourist information, refer to the Nyborg day trip app .
You can drive from Copenhagen to Nyborg in 2 hours. When traveling from Copenhagen in April, plan for slightly colder days in Nyborg, with highs around 45°F, while nights are about the same with lows around 38°F. On the 27th (Mon), you're off toAalborg.
Things to do in Nyborg
Aalborg, is Denmark's fourth biggest city with an urban population of 136.000 (including 22.000 in the twin city Nørresundby 600 meters across the Limfjorden. You've added Nr. Tranders Kirke, Jens Bang's Stenhus, Aalborg Historiske Museum, and other attractions to your itinerary.
Before you visit Aalborg, use our trip planner to discover what you can do and see there.
Use the Route module to find suitable travel options from Nyborg to Aalborg. Traveling from Nyborg in April, you will find days in Aalborg are a bit warmer (52°F), and nights are about the same (37°F). Wrap up your sightseeing on the 28th (Tue) early enough to travel to Kristiansand.
Things to do in Aalborg
Historic Sites Museums
Hirtshals Fyr
Nr. Tranders Kirke
11:30am, Tue Apr 28
Jens Bang's Stenhus
6:00am, Tue Apr 28
2:00pm, Tue Apr 28
Kristiansand, historically Christianssand / Christiansand, is a city and municipality in Norway. To find photos, maps, more things to do, and tourist information, read our Kristiansand trip site .
Explore your travel options from Aalborg to Kristiansand with the Route module. In April, daily temperatures in Kristiansand can reach 50°F, while at night they dip to 34°F. On the 29th (Wed), you'll travel to Oslo.
Outdoors Parks Museums
Tiger City
Norway's capital city, Oslo boasts a thousand years of history and a diverse mix of architecture that blends old, new, and ultra-modern.
You've added Free Tour Oslo, Karl Johans gate, Det Kongelige Slott, and other attractions to your itinerary. There's more to do: step into the grandiose world of Akershus Castle and Fortress (Akershus Slott og Festning) and take an in-depth tour of Viking Ship Museum.
For where to stay, traveler tips, maps, and tourist information, read our Oslo online trip itinerary planner .
Traveling by flight from Kristiansand to Oslo takes 3.5 hours. Alternatively, you can drive; or take a bus. Expect little chillier evenings in Oslo when traveling from Kristiansand in April, with lows around 29°F. Wrap up your sightseeing by early afternoon on the 3rd (Sun) to allow enough time to travel to St. Petersburg.
Historic Sites Museums Theme Parks
Find places to stay Apr 29 — May 3:
Akershus Castle and Fortress (Akershus Slott og Festning)
Free Tour Oslo
3:00pm, Wed Apr 29
Built on a desolate swamp as a showcase capital of Imperial Russia, this grand city has certainly lived up to the expectations of its founder, Tsar Peter the Great.
You've now added AngloTourismo to your itinerary. Start off your visit on the 4th (Mon): get a taste of local nightlife at AngloTourismo, then pause for some serene contemplation at Peter and Paul Fortress, then steep yourself in history at Palace Square, and finally take in the architecture and atmosphere at Savior on the Spilled Blood. On the next day, get engrossed in the history at Peterhof Grand Palace, stroll around Peterhof State Museum Preserve, make a trip to Chasovnya Svyatoy Blazhennoy Ksenii Peterburgskoy, see the interesting displays at Saint Isaac's Cathedral, then admire the masterpieces at The State Hermitage Museum, and finally examine the collection at Faberge Museum.
For traveler tips, ratings, maps, and more tourist information, read our St. Petersburg online trip builder .
You can fly from Oslo to St. Petersburg in 7.5 hours. Other options are to do a combination of flight and train; or drive. The time zone difference moving from Central European Time (CET) to Moscow Standard Time (MSK) is 2 hours. Traveling from Oslo in May, you can expect nighttime temperatures to be somewhat warmer in St. Petersburg, with lows of 45°F. You'll set off for Rome on the 6th (Wed).
Things to do in St. Petersburg
Museums Historic Sites Outdoors
Find places to stay May 3 — 6:
2:30pm, Tue May 5
Saint Isaac's Cathedral
12:30pm, Tue May 5
Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood
3:30pm, Mon May 4
Eternal City
Aptly nicknamed the Eternal City, Rome is the birthplace of the Roman Empire, one of the world's greatest civilizations ever.
You've added Spanish Steps, Campo de' Fiori, Basilica Papale di Santa Maria Maggiore, and other attractions to your itinerary. There's still lots to do: delve into the distant past at Colosseum, don't miss a visit to Trevi Fountain, take in the architecture and atmosphere at Santa Maria in Trastevere, and admire the landmark architecture of Pantheon.
To find maps, photos, traveler tips, and other tourist information, you can read our Rome trip planner.
You can fly from St. Petersburg to Rome in 7.5 hours. Alternatively, you can do a combination of flight and train; or drive. The time zone difference when traveling from St. Petersburg to Rome is minus 2 hours. Prepare for somewhat warmer weather when traveling from St. Petersburg in May: high temperatures in Rome hover around 75°F and lows are around 58°F. Wrap up your sightseeing on the 9th (Sat) to allow time to travel to Barcelona.
St. Peter's Basilica
1:30pm, Fri May 8
8:30pm, Wed May 6
Jewel of the Mediterranean
Barcelona, the country's second-largest city, is a cosmopolitan urban center known for its throbbing youthful energy and stellar architecture.
Barcelona is known for parks, nightlife, museums, shopping, and historic sites. Your plan includes some of its best attractions: admire the striking features of Basilica of the Sagrada Familia, take in the architecture and atmosphere at Barcelona Cathedral, don't miss a visit to Casa Mila - La Pedrera, and admire the masterpieces at Museu Picasso.
For where to stay, maps, photos, and other tourist information, use the Barcelona trip builder website .
Getting from Rome to Barcelona by flight takes about 5.5 hours. Other options: drive; or take a train. In May, plan for daily highs up to 71°F, and evening lows to 57°F. Finish your sightseeing early on the 13th (Wed) to allow enough time to travel back home.
Historic Sites Neighborhoods Tours
Find places to stay May 9 — 13:
2:00pm, Sun May 10
1:30pm, Mon May 11
27 days in Europe BY A USER FROM QATAR March, kids, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, wildlife, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: March, kids, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Medium 29 days in Europe BY A USER FROM COLOMBIA March, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, historic sites, museums, wildlife, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: March, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, historic sites, museums, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Medium 32 days in Copenhagen BY A USER FROM UNITED STATES January, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, hidden gems PREFERENCES: January, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Hidden gems PACE: Medium 26 days in Norway, Sweden & Copenhagen BY A USER FROM AUSTRALIA October, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: October, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Medium 60 days in Africa, Asia, South Pacific, United States, South America, Caribbean & Europe BY A USER FROM NORWAY August, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, popular sights PREFERENCES: August, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular sights PACE: Medium 14 days in Switzerland & Amsterdam BY A USER FROM UNITED ARAB EMIRATES May, kids, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, slow & easy, popular sights PREFERENCES: May, kids, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular sights PACE: Slow & easy 9 days in Lofoten Islands & Copenhagen BY A USER FROM UNITED STATES June, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, slow & easy, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: June, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Slow & easy 4 days in Amsterdam BY A USER FROM ISRAEL December, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: December, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Medium 14 days in Amsterdam, Belgium & Switzerland BY A USER FROM UNITED STATES June, teens, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, popular sights PREFERENCES: June, teens, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular sights PACE: Medium 16 days in Russia BY A USER FROM UNITED ARAB EMIRATES December, teens, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, popular sights PREFERENCES: December, teens, culture, outdoors, relaxing, romantic, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular sights PACE: Medium 55 days in Africa, Europe, Mexico, Canada, Asia & South Pacific BY A USER FROM AUSTRALIA October, culture, outdoors, relaxing, beaches, historic sites, museums, wildlife, popular sights PREFERENCES: October, culture, outdoors, relaxing, beaches, historic sites, museums, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular sights PACE: Medium 12 days in Norway, Copenhagen & Gothenburg BY A USER FROM UNITED STATES April, culture, outdoors, relaxing, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife, popular & hidden gems PREFERENCES: April, culture, outdoors, relaxing, beaches, historic sites, museums, shopping, wildlife ATTRACTION STYLE: Popular & hidden gems PACE: Medium
Hirtshals trip planner
Best things to do in Salt Lake City
Best things to do in Copenhagen
The Most Relaxing Things to Do in Salt Lake City


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Blockchain may be healthcare's answer to interoperability, data security
Meg Bryant Contributor
Flickr; Alan Levine
Developed as a means of tracking international bitcoin transactions over the internet, blockchain technology is starting to send ripples across the healthcare industry with promises of improved data flow between disparate systems and heightened security. The goal is to enhance transparency and trust among participants in the blockchain, while creating a more patient-centric healthcare system, says Micah Winkelspecht, founder and CEO of blockchain startup Gem. Winkelspecht recently spoke with Healthcare Dive from New York City, where he was attending a conference about this new technology.
Healthcare Dive: What exactly is blockchain technology?
Micah Winkelspecht: It really started with bitcoin, which was attempting to create a global accounting system and a global ledger to be able to move around digital currency. Bitcoin is very good at tracking ownership of digital assets, and now financial institutions are looking at taking the same technology and not only using it for digital currency but also to track stocks, bonds, derivatives, futures, basically all of the different financial assets.
The newer blockchain systems are moving from the concept of building a global calculator to building a global computer, and they're allowing for all different types of applications, not just financial applications. Basically, these are applications that run across an entire industry or across global regions where individual members who are participating in that application don't necessarily need to trust each other, but they can still operate on the same application or computer to be able to perform some goal.
So this sort of getting at the whole issue of interoperability?
Winkelspecht: Yes, absolutely. This is a tool that is built for interoperability by design. Essentially, blockchains are really just a protocol layer, like TCP/IP for the internet. It's essentially a bunch of rules that people agree to follow and software that's written to those rules, and anybody can build the software as long as they speak the same rules. So it can be completely open source. It's basically like a language that all of the companies that are participating agree to speak in order to be able to interoperate with each other.
Does blockchain require specific technology that companies have to invest in?
Winkelspecht: There is a lot of technology that has gone into these systems. None of it is really brand new technology. It's old technology that's been combined in a very unique way to create an incredible new type of architecture. A lot of the concepts that are involved go back about 30 years, a lot of basic cryptography concepts. They're called public-key/private-key cryptography, which is really the heart of blockchains. And so the technology's not new. It's a lot of heavily used, trusted concepts, but they're combined in a new way to create this unique type of architecture.
How can blockchain be applied to healthcare?
Winkelspecht: There are a lot of ways that it can be applied to healthcare. We're looking at the entire healthcare continuum, because we really believe that blockchains are going to become the underlying fabric for [that] continuum. It's going to be the architecture of the underlying data layer that unites all of the disparate services of the healthcare industry into one interoperable system — all the way from tracking data from fitness devices and general wellness metrics, to treatment at medical providers, to prescriptions, all the way through to medical claims adjudication.
And what we're trying to build here, essentially, is we want to unite all these services to become more of a patient-centric healthcare system where we're essentially tracking the entire lifecycle of a patient for their entire journey through the healthcare system and are able to give more control to patients over how their data is used and how it's shared, to actually give them access to their own data.
How would you do that?
Winkelspecht: So one of the unique properties about blockchains is that they're not centralized systems. If you think about the current healthcare system, it's based around a bunch of centralized systems — whether it's EHR companies that are managing medical records on behalf of the industry or medical processors that are acting as go-betweens in the middle of providers or insurers — these intermediaries are essentially becoming giant centralized warehouses of patient data.
The blockchain flips that on its head and says, instead of centralizing, let's create a decentralized, distributed, global data repository for the entire industry that's basically shared by everyone and controlled by no one. Rather, it's controlled by everyone, so major participants who are participating in this blockchain also serve to secure and protect it.
This is sort of a fundamental tenet of blockchain. Blockchains are designed as a new type of security model for critical data where the data is completely distributed across many different nodes across the internet. And the change history, or the log of everything that's going on with the data, is recorded in an immutable ledger and an immutable log that can't be changed. And so you have a perfect history of everything that everybody has done within that system. And because you have this immutable ledger, and you have this immutable log of all the events on the network, multiple parties who otherwise wouldn't be able to necessarily trust each other directly can now trust in the ledger, and they can see the history of events and know that it's true.
So this becomes the basis for building out cross-industry workflows between multiple companies that would normally need to go through some intermediary in order to do business with each other or in order to share patient data with each other. This allows them to share in this infrastructure and to be able to communicate directly peer to peer.
How do these security aspects relate to concerns like ransomware?
Winkelspecht: One of the problems with ransomware is that it tends to attack systems that are creating central repositories of data, so when hospitals are getting attacked, the software is attacking systems that are warehousing a lot of data. With a blockchain, that data is spread across the entire network, so there's no one point of failure that you can attack.
So blockchains are going to be a bit of an answer to the ransomware problem, the same way that they're also a part of the cost. Most ransomware is now asking for victims to pay out using bitcoin, which obviously is blockchain technology, but ransomware has been around for a long time and it's used many different methods. It just happens to be using bitcoin today. The reality is that the very same technology that the ransomware hackers use is also going to be the antidote to the ransomware problem by essentially creating failsafe systems where data is not stored in any sort of honey pot.
What are some specific things that Gem is doing with blockchain in the healthcare sector?
Winkelspecht: We're exploring the entire continuum with multiple parties. The only one we've announced so far is Philips, and we're going to have more announcements coming. Unfortunately, I can't talk about the specific case that we're working on with Philips, but we're exploring the way clinical data can move between multiple parties who need to have access to that data, but to do it in a way where there are very strong promises around security and confidentiality and data integrity. We want to make sure that the right person has the right access to the right data at the right time, and no more.
What is the takeaway for healthcare CEOs when it comes to blockchain?
Winkelspecht: Luckily, the healthcare industry has the benefit of the learnings of the financial industry. I've been at this for over three years now, and when I started, the entire financial industry looked at bitcoin and blockchain technology as kind of a joke. They didn't really get it. They said that would never work.
About a year and a half ago, that started to change, and now I'm at a conference with all of those bankers and IBM and major companies around the world. And what I've observed is simply a transformation in the way these organizations are thinking. They've gone from essentially having very little to no knowledge of blockchain to becoming experts, and there's not a single financial institution in the world at this point that doesn't have some sort of blockchain-related product going.
In the healthcare industry, it's very new. While there are companies who are beginning to explore it, it's a very new concept. I would encourage CIOs and CEOs to look at the transformation of the financial industry and to get ahead of the curve.
Filed Under: Health IT
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