text:
Denise O'Sullivan interview: Dash is the word – Houston midfielder dreaming with Irish eyes wide open
by Christian BrookesPosted on June 8, 2016 February 3, 2018
Photo: Keeper Notes
Over half of 2016 is still to be crafted, but Ireland midfielder Denise O'Sullivan has scarcely had chance to draw breath during a year which has dealt both personal pain and incredible enchantment. The 22-year-old is living out a long-held ambition of playing professionally in the U.S. as she represents the Houston Dash, and the sights and sounds so far have been every bit as evocative as she could have wished.
As we continue to hurtle through a historic fourth season of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL), beneath the stats, the tussles for possession, goals and a coveted end-of-season playoff place, the league harbours a storybook. Recent pages have introduced Denise O'Sullivan, one of Ireland's most accomplished players and a 'veteran' of 51 senior international caps despite only turning 22 in February.
A new signing for Houston this season, the former Glasgow City favourite has had well-documented joy and turmoil in recent months, with the passing of her father coming in the same week her move to the U.S. was announced and she was honoured as her national team's Player of the Year. The hurt naturally remains, but the pen writes on for a young woman from Cork as grounded and humble as a family could want their child to be, while fiercely determined to achieve.
Driven by the uncomplicated desire to play the game so many of us fall in love with from young, but with a curiosity to go after its treasures and the conviction to bring them to reality, the attacking midfield performer has made an early impact with the Dash. Scorer of the winning goal at FC Kansas City last month, Denise had been cautious over whether the opportunity to play for Houston was truly about to come to fruition, having wanted such an opening for so long. After the usual negotiations and suchlike, the final process of her visa application was held up while she took her passport away on national team duty to Montenegro and Spain; that her move was delayed is perhaps in keeping with the far from conventional nature of her year, but she made it.
"It means a lot to me to be here," she explained. "I worked hard for years and this is where I wanted to end up; I'm here now and living my dream."
"I got my first start (at home to Orlando on May 20th) and when I was walking out with the team with the fans cheering, in a big stadium, it was fantastic. I'm very grateful to get this opportunity but I'm never happy at where I am; I always want to improve no matter what and I will keep pushing hard to get better and improve my game.
"For me, the big thing here that's different is the physicality of the league and the tempo of the game. It's a lot higher than what I would have been used to but I'm settling in well."
In late April, Denise arrived for her first training session at Houston Sports Park and had her first taste of playing at BBVA Compass Stadium when she made her Dash debut as a half-time sub for Caity Heap in the goalless draw with Sky Blue FC on April 29th. Aside from the sound of her home crowd at the 22,000-capacity arena, she details how her Australian goalkeeping teammate has been responsible for the audial aspect of her time in Texas so far.
"Lydia Williams is usually in charge of the music; she has quite good taste, I quite like her music. We always drive to training together as well so we do be singing our hearts out!
"I live with the two Brazilians, Andressa and Poliana, and two Aussies, Lydia and Ellie (Brush). We live in a private apartment block and it's a nice place; they usually call it the international house."
Someone who most enjoys playing in a role just off the front, Denise scored 33 in 65 games for Glasgow City after joining in the summer of 2013, winning eight trophies in three seasons for Scotland's leading force. Dash coach Randy Waldrum had been impressed by her from footage he had seen and became increasingly sold on her attacking awareness and technical capabilities the more games he saw.
A two-time National Championship-winning coach during his long service with the University of Notre Dame, Waldrum arrived to lead the Dash in their inaugural season of 2014 and has steadily built a team and style over the past couple of years with the NWSL's first expansion club. He likens Denise's way of playing to the team's aforementioned young Brazilian midfielder Andressa 'Andressinha' Machry.
Along with Houston teammates Rachel Daly, Carli Lloyd, Cari Roccaro, Melissa Henderson and Amber Brooks, Andressa is a player who has explored her music and soccer sides on here, and in amongst their friendship, Denise has had a sample of her and defender Poliana's culture by way of samba rhythms.
"Well the Brazilians have a bit of a party in their room every day, not that I understand it or anything as it's all Brazilian music! They are great girls and I get along great with both of them.
"They love Chipotle over here and after away trips when we arrive home we usually go there to eat."
Coming from the Knocknaheeny area of Cork, Denise has grown up as the youngest of ten siblings, with five brothers and four sisters. As a youngster at Wilton United she scored two in an Irish Under-14 Cup final and went on to score for the senior team in an FAI Women's Cup final in 2011, although they lost to St. Catherine's.
If she was to take a step back and reflect on how far she has come since those days it would certainly be cause for great pride, and she has also branched out a little further with her listening habits since then!
"I actually used to make CDs of all different kinds of songs but I used to like listening to that really fast kind of dance music, like DJ Cammy. It's so cringey now looking back!
"I like to listen to a bit of dance and I also like a bit of Take That. If I had to say a genre I don't really like I'd say opera.
"Usually before a game it's a lot of dance that the girls play. Chi (Ubogagu) I think is definitely the dancer of the team (at Houston); she has some very good moves."
Of course Denise isn't the only Irish international to represent the Dash, with forward Stephanie Roche having a spell with the team in 2015. She was the subject of an in-depth interview on this site earlier this year, within which she took the time to single out the talent Denise possesses and the admirable progress she has been making in her young career.
The Sunderland attacker also revealed how the Ireland squad has a strong musical foundation, as the likes of herself, Áine O'Gorman and Ruesha Littlejohn get together for some song and celebration on trips away, with Karen Duggan on the guitar and Julie-Ann Russell playing the tin whistle. Part of the team for almost five years now, is Denise ever one of those involved in these behind-the-scenes performances?
"No, there's just four or five of them and it's like a band! They make videos and stuff and it's brilliant.
"We do initiations now with the national team but didn't when I first came into it. One of the younger girls, Ciara Rossiter, who plays for Wexford, sang to Justin Bieber recently."
Sue Ronan has just had Denise and the rest of her Ireland squad together for a Euro 2017 qualifying double-header, which brought a 4-1 loss in Finland before a record-equalling 9-0 home win over Montenegro. 'The Girls in Green' cannot finish higher than third in the group, with leaders Spain and second-place Finland out of reach, although their long-term efforts continue to be upon reaching a first major tournament.
In April, Ireland were beaten 3-0 in Spain despite Emma Byrne saving an early penalty from captain Vero Boquete and the team competing strongly. A few days earlier, Denise had scored just three minutes after coming on in the 5-0 away win to Montenegro and she was joined on the scoresheet by Glasgow City forward Ruesha Littlejohn, who is never far from the lively antics when the team is together. The 25-year-old former Arsenal and Liverpool player would be high on the list for players you could count on to blast out an impromptu dance or song and as Steph Roche also alluded to on here, Denise confirms it's usually anything but serene when she's around.
"Ruesha's just so funny and is the biggest messer on the team. That girl's just crazy – that's all you can say about her!"
As one of those at the heart of the national team, Denise gets to see the shows the fans generally don't, as her teammates let loose their musically-expressive sides. When it comes to watching the professionals, however, an X-Factor winner who now appears in Coronation Street was one of the first concerts she ever went to.
"My sister bought me a ticket to see Shayne Ward years ago, and I've also been to Tiësto, Calvin Harris and Nicki Minaj. I've always wanted to see Take That and I still do."
Back in March, Ireland beat Euro qualification rivals Finland 2-0 in the seventh place match at the Cyprus Cup. A Reading goalkeeper in the squad had won her first senior cap in their opening game at the tournament against Austria and the 23-year-old would also be the one to line up alongside Denise if she ever had to record a song cover with a teammate.
"It would have to be myself and Grace Moloney. We're always rooming together and she's one of the best DJs because she has a mixture of everything."
Goalkeeper Grace Moloney (left) and Denise on international duty.
Even for those who have been around their respective national team setup for a number of years, when the time comes to pull on the jersey at senior level and step out for that first cap it is something hugely significant. Denise had that very experience in September 2011 for a European Championship qualifier away to Wales in Newport and she would notch the first two for her international goal catalogue, which currently stands at nine.
As she crosses the half-century of games in Irish colours it is easy to forget her relatively tender years. Nevertheless, given the exposure she has had to international football she is a figure who can really help the numerous promising youngsters pursuing their breakthrough, like 19-year-old Florida State University midfielder and fellow Cork native Megan Connolly, who made her first appearance against the United States in January and scored in this month's Montenegro win.
Denise recalls the scene as the first whistle approached on the day of her first cap and the support afforded to her by a highly successful and distinguished former Arsenal duo in the ranks at the time.
"It was obviously great to get my first call-up; I'd only just turned 17 at the time. I remember my first game against Wales and before the game Ciara Grant had a chat with me on the field and told me I was well able to be here.
"We won 2-0 and I scored both goals. There is a bit of banter (in the squad) – the girls make fun of my Cork accent – but they are very supportive as well!
"When I started with the national team, Yvonne Tracy was in there. She's retired now but she'd always support me and ask how I was doing.
"Still to this day she keeps in touch."
Wonderfully, and perhaps luckily for some, football is a universal language all of its own. It is undoubtedly a tremendous help to be able to converse fully with your teammates, but the game essentially allows such communicative barriers to be transcended, at least for those minutes spent lost in on-field freedom.
However, it is often the case that when people from different backgrounds spend a lot of time in each other's company they will tend to share parts of their heritage. Music is a prime example, but has Denise managed to pass on any pearls of Irish speech to her Brazilian housemates, Andressa and Poliana?
"They don't know any yet; if we don't understand each other we get our phones and use Google Translate! It's quite funny, but their English is getting really good."
To walk out for Ireland at a major competition would be a feat which would take some beating for Denise, although she has turned out for her homeland in tournament play as a youth. At the 2010 UEFA Under-17 Championship she was part of the side who finished runners-up to Spain, scoring in the group against Ukraine as the Irish qualified for that year's Under-17 World Cup.
Just 16 at the time, she travelled to Trinidad and Tobago for the tournament, where Ireland's games were played on both of the nation's islands. As part of a squad including future senior players like Clare Shine, Megan Campbell, Ciara Grant and Grace Moloney, Denise got the goal for Noel King's team in the 2-1 quarter-final loss to Japan and she credits that group of players and staff as being like family.
Honoured as the FAI Senior Women's International Player of the Year in March, Denise explains just how much of a fibre football was in her childhood.
"Oh it was absolutely huge. I've got five brothers and three of them are footballers; one of them has a few caps for the juniors with the national team.
"I used to play on the park with my childhood friends with jumpers for goalposts and all that. I loved to play with my brothers when I was young and I think it shows now with how I get stuck in."
Growing up with Manchester United and Barcelona her favoured teams, Denise was bought her first boots by her dad John, who also used to take her to training. Having played for her local Cork City, she made the big step of moving away from home at 19 to join Glasgow City.
Before that move three years ago, she had attracted strong interest from the FA Women's Super League (FA WSL) as both Chelsea and Bristol Academy had made approaches. Feeling she needed greater experience at the time, especially before moving quite so far from home as a switch to England would have demanded, Denise found another group she could truly bond with at Glasgow City.
She won every domestic trophy possible during her time in Scotland, as well as making a clean sweep of the club's awards in 2014 and 2015 as she was honoured by her coaches, teammates and supporters. The 3-0 Scottish Cup final win over Hibernian last season, in which Ireland counterpart and another Cork native, Clare Shine, got a hat-trick, meant that the team had won the domestic treble (also winning the Scottish Women's Premier League and League Cup) for the fourth year in a row.
While with the nine-time consecutive champions, Denise was also recognised by those she competed against, winning the 2014 SWPL Players' Player of the Year award. She had first played for Eddie Wolecki Black, before working under Scott Booth, who described managing her as 'an absolute pleasure.'
As she was preparing to go home for Christmas last year, Denise had told the club she felt ready to move on, with City reluctantly saying they wouldn't stand in her way if somebody was willing to buy out her contract. Houston was that unmissable opportunity she was wishing for, but her feeling for her former side remains strongly intact.
"The club's absolutely fantastic; it's like one big family in how everyone helps each other. I went there in July 2013 and I was welcomed with open arms.
"They text me every day and were great with things like lifts to training. (Club manager) Laura (Montgomery) and (Chairperson) Carol Anne (Stewart) run the club so well.
"I got to do things like play in the Champions League and the club helped me become who I am today. I loved every minute."
Denise and her Glasgow City teammates celebrating Scottish Women's Premier League Cup success in 2015.
When Denise's father passed away this March just a few weeks after his cancer diagnosis, her friends at Glasgow had a minute's silence before their next game. Her former City teammates have also recently given her custom shin pads with photos of their time together, as well as ones of her dad, niece and nephew.
As she highlighted, featuring in notable Champions league ties made Denise's spell with the club that bit more prestigious and in 2013/14 she came up against Arsenal in the last 16. Current Seattle Reign standouts Jess Fishlock and Rachel Corsie were in the City side at the time and they were only beaten 3-2 at home in the second leg by a last-gasp Alex Scott goal.
It was Paris Saint-Germain in the quarter-finals in 2014/15, giving Denise the chance to play at the historic Parc des Princes, and she rates the win over Swiss side FC Zurich to get there as one of her favourite and most exciting career moments. Last season saw City face Chelsea in the last 32 and in her Champions League career to date she has tested herself against such international stars as Kelly Smith, Rachel Yankey, Kim Little, Marie-Laure Delie, Caroline Seger and Laura Georges, priming her for the competition she now has in the NWSL.
Given her pick of any players (male or female, past or present) she would want to stay behind on the training field for some shooting practice with, Denise still decided to go with someone from her City days. It is the club captain and a midfielder who has represented Scotland over 100 times, as well as coming on in the League Cup final last season to set up Susan Fairlie's extra-time winner over Hibs.
"I would probably say Leanne Ross at Glasgow City. Her shooting skills are top-class."
It can often bring instances to the contrary of course, but life has its remarkable way of turning out in a positive sense sometimes. As Denise was travelling with the national team during their stay in the U.S. in January as they took on the seniors and the Under-23s in California, she mentioned to teammate Savannah McCarthy how she wanted to play for a team in the States one day.
She wouldn't have much longer to wait before hearing from Houston, and although the formalities took a little longer than they might have envisaged, she was finally able to tell her proud and delighted dad that was where she was headed for real.
"It was back in January after Ireland played the U.S. when they got in touch. My agency was speaking with them and I had another year on my contract with Glasgow City so that was something that had to be sorted.
"I was meant to go over on March 12th but I got held up. I had my visa interview before I went away with Ireland but I needed my passport to travel with the team, so they couldn't finish the final visa process."
When she was in Glasgow, Denise had been used to a routine of playing games, training and going to the gym, although she got a part-time job in a café back in January. The one-time Peamount United player is currently concentrating fully on her playing endeavours for club and country and Dash fans got their first sight of their number 13 from The Emerald Isle ecstatically celebrating as she swept Chioma Ubogagu's pass into the far corner at FC Kansas City.
The goal was worth a win and also received a nomination for the NWSL's Week 4 Goal of the Week. Ahead of joining up with the Ireland squad for the latest qualifiers she wasn't able to make her fifth appearance for the Dash as their home game with Washington Spirit was postponed following storms in the area.
With the players who will be missing from NWSL play due to the Rio Olympics in August, the likes of Denise will have even more of an integral role to perform and it is something she welcomes. Back home in the South West of Ireland, her family continue to keenly track her progress as she flies the flag, while she keeps a reminder of her biggest fan close by.
"They ring me every day; I speak to my mam on Skype every day and my brothers and sisters all check on me and they give me a FaceTime a few times a week. I think they're always a bit worried about me over here after my dad passed away, but I'm doing good and they're glad.
"I always carry a photo of my dad and have it in the locker room before every game."
Glasgow City club manager Laura Montgomery was one of those emphatic in her praise of Denise, stressing how she managed to surpass their considerable hopes for her when she signed. Along with teammate Clare Shine, she was back home in Cork late last year seeking extra training with Douglas Hall AFC's men's side – another indicator of the commitment to improvement people have been so impressed by.
While her reputation is of course continuing to rise, it is heartening to see her hold onto her humility and connection with where she comes from. For anyone in young adulthood, it is perhaps more of a constant path of discovery than at any other time of life, and athletes are in no way exempt from that, despite what some may believe.
As her footballing facts and figures have grown ever impressive, the personal progression Denise has had over the last three years hasn't been lost on her.
"I've obviously had achievements but I grew a lot of independence as well. My parents did absolutely everything for me and my mam's still fantastic, but I definitely grew into a much more independent person."
At San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge last year.
Regardless of their specific role, the finest operators in midfield have always had an appreciation of both what lies in front of them on the field, and what's happening behind. Denise has a distinct attacking edge but it is about looking back as we finish up here.
The last part of the interviews on the site in recent years has had the players heading to the 5-a-side arena, although only from a fantasy perspective. Given their choice of any teammates from throughout their career, they are asked to select four to go alongside them in this game.
It is always the case that the player can put forward so many more names than they are allowed to, so it is a mere sample of teammates who have made an impression on them. As she was put on the spot, Denise chose from those who have been with her in the years leading up to her U.S. move, resulting in a Scottish/Irish team comprising steel, skill, energy, and of course, entertainment.
"I would have to pick Grace Moloney as goalkeeper – she's just really good! She's a good shot-stopper and I've worked with her for the last few years so I know what she's all about.
"Jo Love (midfielder) from Glasgow City – she's just an all-round player. She works hard, she's good on the ball, and she's got shooting skills.
"Katie McCabe from Arsenal – she's a winger so she'd score a lot of goals in 5-a-side. Ruesha Littlejohn (forward) – I think we link up well and we'd score a lot of goals together in 5-a-side.
"That would be my team!"
To keep track of every one of these interviews, you can follow me: @chris_brookes
You can also like the site on Facebook and stay up-to-date
Posted in InterviewsTagged Denise O'Sullivan, Glasgow City, Houston Dash, Ireland women's national team, NWSL
Published by Christian Brookes
View all posts by Christian Brookes
Prev Alejandro Faurlín interview: Fading out the old-time blues – Rs favourite sings a song of salvation
Next Quincy Amarikwa interview: Making moves and starting grooves – When sound and sense collide for Quakes' showman scholar


text:
Q: Generic Data Type Parameter I have this class which deals with sorting arrays via selectionSort. . .I am having trouble sorting my array in my main function (attached at the bottom)...What is the correct way of calling selctionSort()?
My problem: "The method selectionSort(T[], int) in the type SortArray is not applicable for the arguments (int[], int)" ... I'm trying to pass my int array to the function, which keeps giving me this error.
/**
   Class for sorting an array of Comparable objects from smallest to
   largest.
*/
public class SortArray
{
   /** Sorts the first n objects in an array into ascending order.
       @param a  an array of Comparable objects
       @param n  an integer > 0 */
   public static <T extends Comparable<? super T>> void selectionSort(T[] a, int n)
   {
      for (int index = 0; index < n - 1; index++)
      {
         int indexOfNextSmallest = getIndexOfSmallest(a, index, n - 1);
         swap(a, index, indexOfNextSmallest);
         // Assertion: a[0] <= a[1] <= . . . <= a[index] <= all other a[i]
      } // end for
   } // end selectionSort

   /** Finds the index of the smallest value in a portion of an array.
       @param a      an array of Comparable objects
       @param first  an integer >= 0 and < a.length that is the index of
                     the first array entry to consider
       @param last   an integer >= first and < a.length that is the index
                     of the last array entry to consider
       @return the index of the smallest value among
               a[first], a[first + 1], . . . , a[last] */
   private static <T extends Comparable<? super T>>
           int getIndexOfSmallest(T[] a, int first, int last)
   {
      T min = a[first];
      int indexOfMin = first;
      for (int index = first + 1; index <= last; index++)
      {
         if (a[index].compareTo(min) < 0)
         {
            min = a[index];
            indexOfMin = index;
         } // end if
         // Assertion: min is the smallest of a[first] through a[index].
      } // end for

      return indexOfMin;
   } // end getIndexOfSmallest

   /** Swaps the array entries a[i] and a[j].
       @param a  an array of objects
       @param i  an integer >= 0 and < a.length
       @param j  an integer >= 0 and < a.length */
   private static void swap(Object[] a, int i, int j)
   {
      Object temp = a[i];
      a[i] = a[j];
      a[j] = temp;
   } // end swap
} // end SortArray

public static void main(String[] args) {
    int[] anArray = {15, 8, 10, 2, 5};          // given array

    System.out.println("Printing unsorted array...");
    for(int i = 0; i < anArray.length; i++)
        System.out.print(anArray[i] + " ");

    SortArray.selectionSort(anArray, anArray.length);

    System.out.println("\nPrinting sorted array...");
}

A: Your method expects an array of Objects not an array of primitives. So an int[] won't work, but Integer[] will work.
public static void main(String[] args) {
  // int[] anArray = {15, 8, 10, 2, 5}; // given array
  Integer[] anArray = { 15, 8, 10, 2, 5 }; // given array

  System.out.println("Printing unsorted array...");
  for (int i = 0; i < anArray.length; i++)
     System.out.print(anArray[i] + " ");

  SortArray.selectionSort(anArray, anArray.length);

  System.out.println("\nPrinting sorted array...");
  for (int i = 0; i < anArray.length; i++)
     System.out.print(anArray[i] + " ");

}

Edit: actually, it expects more than an array of Object. They also have to implement the Comparable interface.

A: Look closely to your declaration:
public static <T extends Comparable<? super T>> void selectionSort(T[] a, int n)

T needs to be a type that extends Comparable.
When you are using it:
SortArray.selectionSort(anArray, anArray.length);

first parameter is of type int[], and int is not fulfilling this requirement for T.
Instead of passing in int[], you may consider passing in an Integer[].  Integer itself implements Comparable, and you don't need to change a lot of your code in order to switch using that.  Simply change the declaration of anArray from int[] to Integer[] will probably work already.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Travel Air A-6000-A
A prototype, Model 6000, of this aircraft was rolled out and flown for the first time on April 15, 1928. This monoplane transport was powered with a 200 HP weight J-5 Whirlwind engine and had accommodations for six in a heated cabin fitted with roll-down windows. Basically, the same as the six seat Model 6000; the A-6000-A was developed in answer to the urgent demands of various airlines for a single-engine monoplane with high performance.
The new model was slightly larger than the basic Model 6000. The cabin was sound-proofed and offered comfortable accommodation for six passengers with easily removable seats for bulky cargo. Northwest Airlines, Central Air Lines, and Overland Airways used this type of aircraft in their early years because of the demands of these and other airlines for a single-engined cabin monoplane with extra performance enough to help hold a competitive advantage with higher cruising speeds and a faster climb-out. It was an answer to an on-coming need for a performance that would enable these lines to advertise and to offer faster and more frequent service.
Because of this high performance, progressive business firms were also attracted to it as were many private owners also, such as Wallace Beery,the noted movie actor. One such very particular customer spent a week at the Wichita, Kansas, plant as an interested bystander while his new purchase was being built. Upon its completion and test flight, he flew it home happy in the knowledge that he had seen it built from start to finish. Some 25 examples of this model were built.
LENGTH: 31' 2 HEIGHT: 9'3"
WING SPAN: 54' 5" LANDING SPEED: 60 MPH
MAX SPEED: 140 MPH CRUISE SPEED: 120 MPH
SERVICE CEILING: 18,000 FT FUEL CAP: 130 GAL
CLIMB: 1000 FTIMIN RANGE: 680 MILES
EMPTY WEIGHT: 3225 LBS GROSS WEIGHT: 5250 LBS
ENGINE: 425 HP PRATT &WHITNEY R-1340 WASP RADIAL

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
4K Ultra HD Review: Don't Worry Darling
tags: 4K Ultra HD, Female Director, Movie Review, Physical Media, Warner Bros.
Please note that this is a review of the 4K Ultra HD release of Don't Worry Darling. For my full thoughts on the film itself, you can read my original theatrical review right here.
After releasing in theatres in September, Olivia Wilde's much buzzed about second directorial effort Don't Worry Darling is now debuting on 4K Ultra HD this week.
Mired in reports of behind the scenes drama that spilled out into the open, Don't Worry Darling attracted a lot of pre-release publicity involving gossip about what transpired on-set, which in some ways is more interesting than the uneven film itself.
Set in a seemingly utopic 1950s suburban community, where Alice (Florence Pugh) lives with her husband Jack (Harry Styles) and starts to realize things are not as they seem, Wilde's overly ambitious attempt at a psychological thriller feels surface-deep.
While Florence Pugh's good performance and Matthew Libatique's attractive cinematography keep it from being a total write-off, Don't Worry Darling is a heavily flawed film that frustratingly only shows flashes of true promise. But, despite these ample story problems, the film looks good with its glossy surfaces and 1950s colours, and the 2160p with HDR-10 presentation on the 4K disc is excellent.
Film Rating: ★★ (out of 4)
Bonus Features (4K Ultra HD):
The 4K disc has no bonus features, but the set comes with a regular Blu-ray that includes a featurette and single deleted scene. A code for a digital copy are also included in the package.
• The Making of Don't Worry Darling (17 minutes, 12 seconds): Wilde is joined by members of the cast and crew to discuss the themes of the story, as well as capturing the look of the 1950s through the impressive production design, costumes and cinematography, in this pretty solid behind-the-scenes featurette. It's a bit longer than expected, but given all that reportedly went on behind the scenes, it's easy to feel like tongues are being bitten and stuff is being held back.
• Alice's Nightmare (Deleted Scene) (54 seconds): A black-and-white dream sequence presented on its own without much context.
Don't Worry Darling is a Warner Bros. Home Entertainment release. It's 123 minutes and rated R.
Street Date: November 29th, 2022
from → 4K/Blu-ray/DVD, All
← Review: Spoiler Alert
Review: White Noise →


A guest post by John Wolfe.
One of the most fraught topics on the Marxist left is the ideal of "left unity." We have all heard it called for more than once, and most hope for it in some form or other. However, it again and again fails to materialize. The factionalism of the left remains fodder for bitter jokes within and amusement from without. Further, we all know whose fault it is—those other people. "Sectarian," like "hipster," is a label that is never self-applied. This problem is so endemic it is worth analyzing in some detail, and here I will take a feeble stab at beginning such an analysis.
Once, in the not-so-distant past, there was a country known as the USSR heading up a block of nations experimenting with socialism in one form or another. Sometimes, as with much of what went on in the Twentieth Century, it is hard to believe that this actually happened, that a worker's revolution ushered in a situation where half the world was busily engaged in trying to build an alternative to capitalism. These experiments had mixed results to be sure, but at least they were happening, and happening on a grand scale.
When the USSR existed, one's choice of party was truly significant. To join an official communist party was to literally ally oneself with Moscow and follow their dictates. It was to take a definite side in a war that was far from cold. Even as Eurocommunism and like developments made this relationship slightly more distant, the connection with Moscow remained essential. To join a Trotskyist party, on the other hand, was to take a stand against the USSR, to join a conspiracy to either undermine or radically transform (depending on how one looks at it) the state socialist counties. To join one of the "Marxist-Leninist" parties that blossomed in the US In the Seventies was to side with neither Moscow nor its would-be saviors, but rather to side with a China that was still recognizably anti-capitalist.
In Republic of Silence Sartre famously states that "We were never more free than under the German occupation." This superficially odd statement simply indicates that substantial freedom requires that one's choices be recognized as meaningful, that they have real consequences. Under Nazi occupation the choice to support the resistance or become a collaborator carried with it life or death consequences for oneself, one's family, and one's associates. This is the ultimate validation of political activity.
Before 1991, a leftist's choice of party had such significance. It represented a substantive commitment to one or another international movement and, in many times and places, carried with it a real risk of imprisonment, death, loss of employment, or any number of bad consequences. Things were very real indeed.
The situation now, twenty some years after the collapse of the Eastern Bloc, is unrecognizable by comparison. Despite the recent popular insurrections throughout Europe, despite the continued existence of many, largely stalled, guerrilla movements, and despite even the stunningly vibrant and heartening activities of the Bolivarians, a harsh neoliberal capitalism reigns throughout the world. The power of labor is in retreat, and what victories we win are largely Pyrrhic. In this situation, our activities and theoretical positions have been robbed of consequences and significance. These days, a communist can't even get arrested.
In this depressing situation, in developed nations like the US, leftism becomes more of a lifestyle than anything else. It is a posture one adopts, of little more meaning than becoming a goth, listening to dubstep, or shopping at Whole Foods. Despite one's best intentions, choosing a side in sectarian debate becomes little more than a way of carving out a personal identity. For, let's face it, whatever your opinion on the NEP, the particular historical situation that gave rise to it is not going to repeat itself, and nothing remotely like that situation will arise, until we are well into a revolutionary process. Until then, all activists on the Marxist left are engaged in nearly identical objectively reformist issue advocacy and labor organization efforts.
At this point, sectarian "enemies" come to the rescue. They keep the left alive by convincing its members that their choices are significant. Without that vocal sectarian opponent attacking everything you hold dear, you would have to face the harsh fact that no one gives a damn what you think of the Kronstadt rebellion, and frankly that it does not matter. However, deep down, we need that—and this is the problem. Just as Marcuse observed that modern society sustains itself by creating false needs, I would maintain the left sustains itself by creating false disputes. We need a way forward that minimizes this. I hope we can find this way, but all I have seen so far indicates that that this hope has little foundation.
Sectarian disputes then are both a pernicious phenomenon self-cannabalizing the left and stunting its effectiveness and a vital means by which the left sustains itself and avoids absorption into liberalism. We cannot hope to overcome petty squabbling until such time as we begin to score real victories. Until then, the best solution is to realize that there is little harm in embracing a diversity of tactics, gritting our teeth, and enduring the unstable mutually-sustaining antagonism we now have.
Love to read the posts - very thought-provoking.


text:
Don't Kill the Birthday Girl
Tales from an Allergic Life
Sandra Beasley (View Bio)
Hardcover: Crown, 2011.
"Charming…. Beasley is a warm and lively guide to the quirky world of allergies…. She also helpfully turns her attention to the recent wave of medical research and hypotheses about food allergies…. A vital call to arms for allergy awareness." — Judy Bolton-Fasman, Boston Globe
"Exceptional…. Beasley skillfully weaves the personal with the scientific…. With no self-pity, anger or despair, she eloquently pulls back the curtain on what is the way of life for the medically (as opposed to self-) diagnosed 12 million people living with food allergies today. Not only is her memoir an invaluable resource for parents of children with allergies, as well as the children themselves, it also is a testament to Beasley's admirable strength and sharp sense of humor in the face of personal adversity." — Meganne Fabrega, Minneapolis Star Tribune
"In this intelligent and witty memoir, poet Beasley recounts her lifelong struggle to live a normal life while waging a battle against deadly food allergies. The author is one of 'more than 12 million Americans who have been diagnosed with food allergies, a figure that includes almost 4% of all children.' The title of this enthralling book is not hyperbole. As little as a kiss or hug from a family member or a friend who had eaten cake or ice cream at a birthday party could cause Beasley to break out in hives or, worse, suffer anaphylactic shock. She calls sherbet 'sweet, icy death in a bowl.' Beasley details her vigilant parents' never-ending routine for keeping her safe during her childhood until she left for college, how she and her friends coped with 'the thousand minor hassles of living with' her food allergies during college, and the perils of eating while traveling. Throughout this thoughtful and well-written book, Beasley closes the knowledge gap surrounding food allergies. She writes entertainingly about the history of allergies, and current research findings; religious issues surrounding food allergies; and processed foods and their hidden ingredients." — Publishers Weekly
"Award winner Beasley (e.g., Barnard Women Poets) offers a cultural study of living the 'allergic life'." — Library Journal
"Imagine a birthday cake made without dairy products or eggs. That's what highly allergic author Beasley faces every year—hence her friends' and relatives' constant refrain, "Now, don't kill the birthday girl." As she notes, she's hardly alone: more than 12 million Americans have been diagnosed with food allergies. She worries about whether she'll add to that tally when she gives birth. Her book is full of interesting (and potentially lifesaving) tidbits: Play-Doh contains wheat. Tempera paints often contain egg. Moisturizing soap may contain soy proteins or cashew oil. Borden used to make Elmer's glue with a milk derivative, casein. And French fries are a good choice for the highly allergic. (There are no hidden nuts, dairy, or eggs in them.) People with wheat allergies need to be careful at communion: A decade ago, Boston's Roman Catholic Church affirmed its decree that rice-based wafers were an unacceptable substitute for the regular wheat-based variety. This information- and anecdote-filled book will be a welcome antidote to the worries and fears endured by families with food allergies." — Booklist
"Fascinating…humane and informative." — Kirkus Reviews


Is it a good idea to post your children's question on Facebook?
After a visit to the Kunsthal in Rotterdam today I was faced with a hard choice… would I put a picture of our two youngest children on Facebook to have a question they have answered on their request?
Doing so will potentially expose them to thousands or millions of people. You could say that they cannot oversee the potential consequences of doing something like this. Perhaps your children's picture will be used for advertising. Someone might put a 'funny quote' or 'meme' under the picture. Or there might even be people that get off on the picture.
Have I considered all these things? Yes I have. And after considering this and consulting with my dearest wife Tessa I thought let's just see what happens. After all, the question Huub and Lieke have is quite valid and I hope someone will come up with an answer that might actually learn them something.
← Farmers Camping, a mini society.


text:
Prince of Wales Theatre
31 Coventry Street, London, W1D 6AS
Search for The Book of Mormon tickets
Coventry Street
W1D 6AS
The Prince of Wales Theatre is right in the heart of the bustling Leicester Square/ Piccadilly Circus area. Surrounded by theatres, restaurants, bars and late night shops, this district is one of the most vibrant places to be in London, especially by night! Leicester Square is well-connected in terms of transportation and is on many major bus routes. For London travel updates visit http://www.tfl.gov.uk/
The nearest National Rail station to The Prince of Wales Theatre is Charing Cross (10 minutes walk away). From Charing Cross rail station head left out of the station and across the back of Trafalgar square. Turn right by the Canadian Embassy and right up Whitcomb Street. Turn left onto Orange Street and then the first right up towards Coventry Street. The theatre will be on your right hand side.
The Prince of Wales Theatre is closest to Piccadilly Circus (Bakerloo and Piccadilly lines) and Leicester Square (Northern and Piccadilly lines) tube stations, which are both a short walk away. Please see the directions below:
Piccadilly Circus (1 min) – Taking the Leicester Square exit from the tube, head straight down Coventry Street. The theatre will be on your right hand side.
Leicester Square (4 mins) – From the station head down towards Leicester Square. Keep walking in a straight line and the theatre will be on your left hand side.
Buses do not travel directly through Leicester square so the best option is to take the bus to Haymarket, which is a street off Leicester square.
For Haymarket 3, 6, 12, 13, 19, 23, 38, 88, 139
For Charing Cross Road 24, 29, 176
The Prince of Wales Theatre is within the London Congestion Charge Zone which applies weekdays from 7am until 6pm and costs £11.50 per day. If you are driving to the theatre after 6pm then you will not be charged.
The Prince of Wales Theatre is part of the Q-Park Scheme. The nearest participating car park is the 24hr Q Park Chinatown Car Park (20 Newport Place, WC2H 7PR). Parking costs £18 for up to 3hrs, and £24 for 4hrs but theatregoers can save 50% if they have their ticket validated at the theatre.
The Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus areas are potentially the busiest areas in London in terms of people in the street at any given time. Because of this there is a wealth of taxis in the area which can be flagged down from the curb. However if you would like to guarantee a cab, there is a taxi rank at Charing Cross rail station.


Fourteen-year-old Nathan Archuleta was home alone with the flu when he came face-to-face with an adult burglar standing in the kitchen of his Pueblo, Colorado, home. Recognizing he had been caught in the act, the thief grabbed a kitchen knife and slashed the terror-struck boy in the arm. Archuleta dashed for his bedroom, hoping to escape the full-grown attacker, who followed closely behind him. With nowhere else to run, the boy grabbed his BB gun from his dresser and shot the criminal, who miraculously fled the house.


text:
Ioana Cerasella Chis, Big Data: A Technology of Anxiety
This paper proposes an understanding of big data and anxiety within Western countries as intimately coproduced and sustained within a technocratic ideological framework. With the rise of neoliberalism, which has shaped the political and economic organisation of Western societies, more 'efficient' systems and neopositivist 'science' called 'big data' have been created. The accumulation of information cannot however be equated with the growth of knowledge, as the data captured by new technologies is used for private ends: the accumulation of capital and control by a small elite. As such, new data can be gathered about subjectivities, bodies and performance, and used to further pressure individuals to fit into preconceived frameworks and identities as a result of the top-down creation of individualised pseudo-problems which can cause anxiety, especially when they are not tackled collectively. The paper navigates different approaches to anxiety and big data, critiquing the technocratic solutions to social problems offered by big data science. Big data will be discussed as a 'technological' creation, an infrastructure which defines, represents, conditions, manages, and sustains human subjectivity, corporeal affects, and the organisation of society. The ambivalence of big data will be illustrated, as it is used both as a solution and tool for producing, but also coping with anxiety. All strategies are deeply political, underlined by a feeling of anxiety which ought to be articulated politically, to encourage a cooperative search for new ways of overcoming technological control and fostering care and collective action. Sociology must remain critical in its engagement with big data in order to reveal practices of depoliticisation, quantification, standardisation, monitorisation and sanctioning, and the reduction of social reality and experience to algorithms.
With the development of the internet and portable technological devices, private lives have become increasingly prone to being permeated by excessive and intrusive technologies, the body being transformed into a resource and machine which generates data. The speed and nature of data collection are accelerated to the extent where technocratic control may become incorporated and augmented within everyday life and the body/life itself. Not only has technology become 'invisible' in daily routine, but it also helps foster so-called progress, productivity and efficiency for capital accumulation by the elite, to the point where 'the body is becoming a core product at the frontier of commodification'.1 This particular kind of data came to be known as 'big data', on the basis of which big data science and methods have developed.
The first use of the term 'big data' in an academic journal was in 2003, and over the course of the following five years its use became widespread.2 In a nutshell, big data is 'a cultural, technological, and scholarly phenomenon that rests on the interplay of technology, analysis, and mythology that provokes extensive utopian and dystopian rhetoric'.3 Examples of the production of big data are: digital CCTV, mobile phones, emails, online banking, clickstream data, sensors embedded into objects, travel passes or barcodes, and social media postings.4 Although there is no consensus over its historical origins, traces of big data can be located even before the rise of the internet. For instance, in the late-nineteenth century, big data was used by International Business Machines (IBM), which was founded as a census tabulating company. They collected personal data, and later profited from and maintained monopoly over information and technology, providing, for example, systems for the identification of Jews to the SS in Nazi Germany.5 In 2014, the Chairman of IBM Europe declared that 'to realise the promise of big data does not require sacrificing personal privacy'.6 Considering IBM's track record with regards to balancing ethics and profit, and the history of exploitation that underlies their position as one of the world's most lucrative companies, warrants a heavy degree of scepticism over such displays of benevolence by its management.
It is necessary to acknowledge how the maintenance and development of big data have become possible. Big data is both science and technology: as technology, it is produced through labour and private property, being used by its owners for their interests; as science, it employs specific methods, rationalities and epistemologies. The material base of big data cannot be separated from the social organisation of society –without the individuals who create technological 'hardware' and 'software' through labour; without those who buy and use them (for whatever means and ends), and without the elite who monopolise it, big data would not exist in its current form.
Kitchin identifies two approaches to big data methodology: one is empiricism (data speaks for itself) and the other is data-driven science 'that radically modifies the existing scientific method by blending aspects of abduction, induction and deduction'. Whilst he predicts that the latter approach will win more terrain within academia, he calls for more reflexive data-driven science. However, the claim that big data has developed a new science is a 'mythological artefact', as it implies that the 'precepts and methods of scientific research change as the data sets increase in size'.7 Indeed, its method is simply 'N = all', when N is merely an epistemic collective which shares particular features – subjectivities and preferences which, if not understood sociologically, may be misrepresented.8 Big data's apparent solutions are artefacts to ideological pseudo-problems (presented as the responsibility of structurally marginalised groups) for ideals of scientific progress and economic accumulation.
Data mining and algorithms are marketed as the ultimate source of knowledge, technology allegedly offering the possibility to go beyond human cognition, to offer neutral, objective knowledge based on patterns and correlations. The reliance on algorithms and positivist methods to dismiss metaphysical claims, and the belief that something other than human interpretation can explain how reality really is, form the neopositivist method of big data. As a consequence, hermeneutics is replaced with statistics, and 'truth' with data itself.9 In short, big data science is 'a shallow version of neoempiricism',10 a 'chimera'11 which has declared war to theory; an opaque, private enterprise which does not, under current conditions, enhance the growth of knowledge, nor does it allow for contestation from below for a more dialogic science and knowledge.
The use of big data for social analysis superficially assesses behaviour as it 'appears' (through the lens of the privileged), without accounting for inequalities and the negotiation of meanings across contexts, leading to an intensification of stereotypes. Those with epistemological authority use means of disseminating knowledge to frame debates and policies in their own terms, often neglecting social problems which do not 'fit' the dominant paradigm. For instance, big data cannot, by itself, explain and redress institutional racism: 'data is not color blind, not gender blind and marketers use it to have ever more precise categories about you'. The translation of cultural clichés into 'empirically verifiable datasets' builds biases into the knowledge produced by the subsequent findings.12 An illustrative example is the research done by COSMOS (a cross-institutional, academic research group) in which subjectivities are inferred when using 'data-light' tweets (that is, tweets which do not explicitly include references to gender, location, class):
although such data is not present in an explicit manner, the tools available on the COSMOS platform enable it to be inferred with a relatively high level of confidence.13
For sociologists, this affirmation should raise ethical, political, philosophical and sociological concerns. Hacking's term of 'making up' people is useful to explain the above statement: 'who we are is not only what we did, do, and will do but also what we have done and may do'.14 'Making up' categories based on arbitrarily chosen features of individuals in order to make sense of 'raw' data and to define the 'wholeness' of personhood misrecognises individual and social changes, possibilities and capabilities. Needless to say, COSMOS' tools are not 'neutral', unbiased and, for that matter, accurate, as social categories are contested, fluid and self-defined. The assumptions behind big data science take politics and historical contingencies away from people's decisions and daily struggles, and assess patterns at face-value, reproducing the ideology of neoliberalism, which hides its political assumptions and tradition in order to present an individualistic and inward-looking self who no longer consumes only to satisfy their (supposed) needs, but in pursuit of a state of happiness and fulfilment. Neoliberalism can be briefly explained as the 'disenchantment of politics by economics',15 its success resting on the (neo)positivist knowledge which considers society as nothing more than the sum of its parts – what Gillespie calls 'calculated publics'. The knowledge created through the use of new forms of technology by studies such as COSMOS' is used to define and order society and its problems. Quantification and categorisation occur without the subjects even being aware.
Mills sees technologically advanced societies of the twentieth century characterised by public issues and private troubles. In The Sociological Imagination, he makes an apt distinction between 'the personal troubles of milieu' and 'the public issues of social structure'.16 He goes further to say that when one is not aware of any values they may hold, and does not feel threatened, one becomes indifferent and apathetic. When, on the other hand, one is not aware of any values they may hold, but is aware of threats, one experiences uneasiness which can freeze and bring a person to despair, to a state of inaction, if the fear is total enough Mills described the time the society he was living in as a time of 'private uneasiness and public indifference'.17 This depiction of 'uneasiness' as private trouble and 'indifference' as public issue still characterises contemporary Western societies, but more than before, private uneasiness has reached higher levels due to audit culture, austerity measures and their attack on community ties, and the technological permeation and organisation of society and private lives.
Under neoliberalism, 'the problem of anxiety, considered on its own terms, is generally not recognised to be in need of any substantive sociological analysis'.18 The very portrayal of anxiety as a negative condition asks for solutions to 'combat' it. In this paper I discuss the existential and phenomenological experiences of anxiety as affect. Affect is always a movement which occurs in-between 'micro' and 'macro' spheres, throughout processes and relations within and between individuals, collectives and institutions. It belongs to the 'bodily sphere', and it involves ever-changing human and nonhuman bodies which can disrupt and mobilise action and create patterns.19 Through the understanding of anxiety as affect, we can discuss the inter-relationality between humans and matter. In this case, big data is a matter, a technology which has the capacity to be self-organised (based on algorithms and technological capacities) and informational.20 Technologies and affects ought to be mobilised outside pre-established, top-down frameworks of reference, in order to allow for alternative forms of praxis and the creation of new spaces for contestation and care outside institutional and technologically-mediated interactions. Seeing big data and anxiety as co-constitutive processes in continuous development and change allows for possibilities to devise strategic deviations. In other words, regarding anxiety as an experience triggered by external pressures and ideologies avoids the pathologisation of the human condition and the relativisation of 'cultural effects'.
Big data as a technology of anxiety
Whilst technology and digitalisation save time and relieve individuals of certain responsibilities and chores, they also affect the notion of community. In a neoliberal, individualist environment, subjects are made to compete among themselves but also with technological machines as the individual is remotely supervised and to technological devices. Hardship, 'failure' to perform according to set matrices, and anxiety are interpreted as personal limitations which need overcoming, self-training and management, rather than being recognised as structural issues emanating from such developments as the de-skilling of jobs, as well as the preservation of profit by technology owners.
In the construction of the individual as a machine for capital production, the 'quantified self' category emerges, as the person who willingly uses technology to increase their wellbeing and (primarily) their productivity. The precursor of the quantified self is 'the entrepreneur', whose subjectivity is linked to classical economics, its main features being 'creativity' and 'connectivity'.21 In the words of Krizner, member of the Austrian Economics School, 'all individual action, when unfettered by the state is, by nature, entrepreneurial'.22 The assumed rationality of the entrepreneurial self is utility maximisation – a consequentialist and behavioural approach based on rational choice theory according to which behaviour is predictable and linear. Herbert Simon, contradicting the narrowness of this model, holds that the rationality which characterises human psychology is 'bounded rationality': decision-making is based on the amount of information at one's disposal – which may be limited. Decisions can be influenced by unpredictable factors not necessarily related to utility maximisation. In other words, we are all 'satisficers' – always looking for 'good enough' solutions and shortcuts.23
Whilst the tools for mapping the entrepreneur's behaviour used to be tabular datasets, the mapping of 'bounded rationality' is based on networks and correlations which can be ever-changing, and thus collectors need to engage in constant monitorisation. Companies can pretend to 'inform' individuals of a variety of 'choices', but in doing so, pseudo-choices, pseudo-problems, and abstract categorisations are created. Correlations are then analysed on the basis of behavioural and psychological patterns. I contend that the belief in the plausibility of this type of rationality underpins big data and marks the distinction between 'the entrepreneur' and 'the quantified self'.
In 2007, the Quantified Self Movement emerged, which adopts a personalised, technology-driven approach to the social, political, economic, health, education and other aspects of society, its motto being 'self-knowledge through numbers'. Its adherents claim they feel empowered by using technology, self-management and monitoring.24 'The quantified self' does not have a unified definition – it is usually used to describe the happy consumer whose self-identity is based on their consumption and lifestyle choices, and the desire to be 'successful'. However, quantification in current Western societies is not a desire which leads to more individual autonomy, but rather is an imposed top-down process which affects individuals and groups regardless of their social positionality. It is for this reason that I suggest the 'quantified self' to be a term whose definition should be broadened to encompass not just the conspicuous consumer, but the full complexity of social and political processes. For more clarity, therefore, the self-identifying 'quantified self' will be referred to in this paper as the 'quantified consumer'.
An example of a self-managing technology used by quantified consumers is 'Happify', a mobile application marketed as a scientifically-approved tool to be used for one's 'natural' self-interest to quantify and enhance their happiness. According to its developers, happiness is a choice, as one can be 'trained to be happy'.25 As aesthetics and the promise of the script-based 'good life' benefit from an increasing preoccupation in daily lives, we can assume that the 'Happify' users are generally concerned with self-evaluation to fit a standardised 'norm', as a way of 'passing' for privileges.26 However, this readiness to measure one's happiness through the use and sharing of data converges with dominant actors' economic interests. At one end of the spectrum there is the company which profits from selling 'Happify', and at the other end there is the employer who profits from the emotional labour and discipline of the worker/user. In-between we find the complexity of social, political, historical and economic dynamics, systems, affects, laws and practices which are reinforced and legitimised, always decreasing the level of control of the quantified consumer's life. In this context, individual autonomy is illusory: one has to adapt to an audit culture and strategise their way to 'happiness' and success by acting competitively and in isolation from others. This inward-looking, 'self-fixing' attitude discourages any attempts to challenge organisational practices. Here it is 'rational' to be selfish, to avoid 'standing out'. Thus, affective work is constitutive of technological control.
Anxiety is not discussed in a society where greed and competition are promoted as ethical, empowering approaches to living. Contexts and space to discuss one's feelings cannot be integrated in technocratic and neoliberal frameworks, in the same way as subjectivities and affects cannot be fully captured by big data. Although 'the loneliness of leadership' is lamented on business websites, the ideological underpinning of one's desire to be a 'leader' (despite the anxiety risks), and the destructive effects of competition are ignored. One firm, [name], suggested that 'advisors […] listen to your ideas, keep them in confidence, and feed back to you what they honestly think' (my emphasis).27 However, these honest discussions would still occur within the entrepreneurial and productivist framework which sustains the belief that one's self-esteem ought to rely on others' envy.
Although the uni-linear economic rationality of neoliberal societies assumes that all wants have equal merit,28 the quantified consumer's interaction with big data is qualitatively different from the experience of the jobseeker's benefits claimant: the former is depicted as striver, the latter as skiver. The punitive aspect of quantification is revealed more overtly in the use of big data as part of the management of the performance, body and autonomy of the jobseeker's benefits claimant in Britain. Three instances will be discussed here. Firstly, digital divide is maintained through an imbalance of access and skills for using technology. The Universal Credit Scheme (a means-tested benefit introduced in 2013 in Britain, replacing previous in- and out-of-work benefits with one payment), allocates benefits directly into bank accounts.29 Applications are online-only, and often applicants need to use public libraries for internet access, whilst libraries are increasingly being privatised.30 Not enough digital skills support is available as advocacy organisations' funding had been cut drastically.31
Secondly, the monitorisation of the jobseeker and benefits claimant is a tool for financial sanctioning. In 2013 alone, 871,000 people were sanctioned by the Department for Work and Pensions (Gentleman 2014). Since March 2013, jobseekers and benefit claimants have been forced to register on the Universal Jobmatch website to find a job; if they spent less than 35 hours per week applying for jobs, they could face benefits sanctions.32 The scheme permanently and remotely monitors and forces claimants off benefits – £300 million of benefits are withheld in sanctions every year.33 Those made vulnerable are used as resources for data and capital extraction, whilst greater control by the government over public finances, against individuals, is established. Human labour is increasingly being 'de-skilled' through its replacement with time and cost-saving technology, the ideal twenty-first century worker is flexible, committed to a disciplined work ethic, and grateful for their work being waged, despite them being squeezed to comply with worsening conditions. Uncertainty, coupled with the 'benefit scroungers' discourse and the need for constant proof of moral genuineness when asking for support, have demoralising effects. Being the subject of social failure was an unbearable experience of anxiety which contributed to the death of a man whose benefits were stopped; shortly before his death, he stated that 'even the sight of a CV would give me an anxiety attack'.34
Thirdly, one's own bodily presence is monitored by the Job Centre: applicants are forced to check-in five days a week to avoid financial sanctions.35 According to a benefits claimant, 'I have just been sanctioned for three weeks for missing an appointment. Although they say missing, I was actually there, but five minutes late'.36 Time, in this case, was used as an excuse for restricting somebody's needed financial support, despite the person being actually there. The jobseeker claiming benefits constantly affects and is affected by mental, physical, temporal, spatial, bureaucratic, political, economic, technological and informational spheres and influences. As an individual's worth is filtered through quantified performance data, a zero-sum situation is created: they use big data as a coping tool to avoid sanctions, whilst the same big data is used as a tool for sanctions.
The deeper (smaller) and wider (in larger quantities) data is, the better – so the story goes. Subjects are anxious not to reveal too much, nor too little. The fear of surveillance of missing opportunities to access the fullest meaning of (potentially) available data animates organisations to invest in data mining technologies:
If we take these twinned anxieties — those of the surveillers and the surveilled — and push them to their natural extension, we reach an epistemological end point: on one hand, the fear that there can never be enough data, and on the other, the fear that one is standing out in the data.37
Although companies can detect patterns through monitorisation, it is another thing to explain them. In effect, big data scientists try to control outcomes and policies (and populations' behaviour), to later present their findings as true, pretending to have had access to the 'inner' subjectivity of their subjects. From all the examples above, it is clear that in the production of big data, the affect of anxiety plays a constitutive role, just as big data constitutes a factor in the creation of anxiety.
In line with Mills's description of the workings of technologically developed societies, the problems created by big data science become pseudo-public issues. These public problems are based on abstract constructions of categories. When one fails to meet expectations and standards, the feelings of 'lack' and guilt are translated into private trouble, instead of structural failure caused by an elite. Private ownership of production, unequal distribution of technology, algorithmic manipulation, prejudices, and epistemological authority determine who and what counts in datasets, and which type of technology is to be invested in as part of strategies for capital accumulation. Within neoliberalism, the individualistic portrayal of the subject, austerity measures and the myth of the 'good life', affect both the vulnerable and the happy consumer. The subjects are coerced into making decisions which can be manipulated much more easily, creating patterns as reactions to punitive processes. The promise of big data to 'predict' behaviour becomes less a 'prediction' when populations are under constant monitoring which in recent times encompasses unwaged bodily labour, as the collection of personal information is capitalised.
Ioana Cerasella Chis is an MA student in Social and Political Theory at the University of Birmingham and an editor of The New Birmingham Review, a progressive student journal which publishes pre-doctorate work.
1 Stephen R. Bates, 'The Emergent Body: Marxism, Critical Realism and the Corporeal in Contemporary Capitalist Society', Global Society, 29.1 (2015), 128-47, p. 146.
2 Tom Boellstorff, 'Making Big Data, in Theory', First Monday, 18.10 (2013) <http://dx.doi.org/10.5210/fm.v18i10.4869> [accessed 31 October 2014].
3 danah boyd and Kate Crawford, 'Critical Questions for Big Data: Provocations for a Cultural, Technological, and Scholarly Phenomenon', Information, Communication & Society, 15.5 (2012), 662-79, p. 662.
4 Rob Kitchin, 'Big Data, New Epistemologies and Paradigm Shifts', Big Data & Society Journal, 1.1 (2014), 1-12, p. 2.
5 Edwin Black, 'IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation', The New York Times (October 2000); see <https://www.nytimes.com/books/first/b/black-ibm.html> [accessed 6 November 2014].
6 Harry van Dorenmalen, 'Big Data is in Danger of Becoming Demonised', EurActiv, 23 March 2014 <http://www.euractiv.com/sections/infosociety/big-data-danger-becoming-demonised-300521> [accessed 6 November 2014].
7 Kate Crawford, Mary L. Gray, Kate Miltner, 'Critiquing Big Data: Politics, Ethics, Epistemology', International Journal of Communication, 8 (2014) 1663-72 , p. 1664.
8 Tim Harford, 'Big Data: Are We Making a Big Mistake?', Financial Times, 28 March 2014 <http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/21a6e7d8-b479-11e3-a09a-00144feabdc0.html> [accessed 24 December 2014].
9 Crawford, Gray and Miltner, 'Critiquing Big Data', p. 1670.
10 Rosi Braidotti, The Posthuman (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2013), p. 4.
11 Martin H. Frické, 'Big Data and Its Epistemology', Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 66.4 (2015).
12 Cecilia Rabess, 'Can Big Data Be Racist?', The Bold Italic, 31 March 2014 <http://www.thebolditalic.com/articles/4502-can-big-data-be-racist> [accessed 15 December 2014].
13 William Housley and others, 'Big and Broad Social Data and the Sociological Imagination: A Collaborative Response', Big Data & Society, 1.2 (2014), 1-15, p. 8.
14 Ian Hacking, 'Making Up People', in The Science Studies Reader, ed. Mario Biagioli (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 165.
15 William Davies, The Limits of Neoliberalism: Authority, Sovereignty and the Logic of Competition (London: SAGE Publications, 2014), p. 4.
16 C. Wright Mills, The Sociological Imagination (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1959), p. 8.
17 Ibid., p. 11.
18 Iain Wilkinson, Anxiety in a 'Risk' Society: Health, Risk and Society (London: Routledge, 2001), p. 130.
19 Carolin Wiedemann, 'Swarms, Memes and Affects: A New Materialist Approach to the Infrastructure of 4chan', in Neighbourhood Technologies: Media and Mathematics of Dynamic Networks, ed. Tobias Harks and Sebastian Vehlken (Chicago and Zurich: Chicago University Press, forthcoming 2015), p. 4.
20 Patricia T. Clough, 'The Affective Turn: Political Economy, Biomedia and Bodies', in The Affect Theory Reader, ed. Melissa Gregg and Gregory J. Seigworth (London: Duke University Press, 2010), p. 210.
21 Simon Lilley and Geoff Lightfoot, 'The Embodiment of Neoliberalism: Exploring the Roots and Limits of the Calculation of Arbitrage in the Entrepreneurial Function', The Sociological Review, 62.1, 68-89, p. 71.
23 Herbert A. Simon, Models of Bounded Rationality: Empirically Grounded Economic Reason, 3 vols (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1982-97), iii, pp. 291-8.
24 'The Quantified Self: Counting Every Moment', The Economist <http://www.economist.com/node/21548493> [accessed 15 December 2014].
25 Melanie Pinola, 'Happify Trains You to be Happy, Using Games Backed by Science', LifeHacker, 24 October 2013 <http://lifehacker.com/happify-trains-you-to-be-happier-using-science-based-g-1451531808> [accessed 25 December 2014].
26 Kitchin, 'Big Data, New Epistemologies and Paradigm Shifts', p. 8.
27 Columbia Consultancy, 'Decision Making: The Loneliness of Leadership' (2006) <http://www.columbiaconsult.com/pubs/v46_Feb06.html> [accessed 22 December 2014].
28 Rod Hill and Tony Myatt, The Economics Anti-Textbook: A Critical Thinker's Guide to Microeconomics (London: Zed Books, 2010), p. 16.
29 TUC, Will Universal Credit Work? – Report (London: Trades Union Congress, 2013), p. 2.
30 Alison Flood, 'Kirklees set to close 24 of its 26 libraries', The Guardian, 30 July 2014 <http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/jul/30/kirklees-close-24-26-libraries-cuts> [accessed 23.12.2014].
31 Amelia Gentleman, 'Charities say millions without internet access will face benefits struggle', The Guardian, 21 February 2013 <http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/feb/21/universal-credit-online-benefit-claimants> [accessed 18 December 2014].
32 Citizens Advice Bureau, 'Universal Credit – What is the Work Search Requirement?', Citizens Advice Bureau <http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/england/benefits_e/benefits_welfare_benefits_reform_e/benefits_uc_universal_credit_new/benefits_uc_work_related_requirements/benefits_uc_what_are_the_work_related_requirements/benefits_uc_what_is_the_work_search_requirement/uc26_uc_what_is_the_work_search_requirement.htm> [accessed 18 December 2014].
33 HC Deb, 18 December 2014, vol 589, c1664; see <http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201415/cmhansrd/cm141218/debtext/141218-0004.htm#141218-0004.htm_spnew3> [accessed 20 December 2014].
34 Guardian Readers and James Walsh, '"Even the sight of a CV would give me an anxiety attack": Guardian readers on benefit sanctions', The Guardian, 5 August 2014 <http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/aug/05/even-the-sight-of-a-cv-would-give-me-an-anxiety-attack-guardian-readers-on-benefit-sanctions> [accessed 13 November 2014].
35 Maya Oppenheim, 'Claimants will be forced to visit job centres for 35 hours a week or face sanctions', New Statesman, 11 September 2014 <http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/09/claimants-will-be-forced-visit-job-centres-35-hours-week-or-face-sanctions> [accessed 18 December 2014].
36 Guardian Readers and Walsh, 'Even the Sight of a CV Would Give Me an Anxiety Attack'.
37 Kate Crawford, 'The Anxieties of Big Data', The New Inquiry, 30 May 2014 <http://thenewinquiry.com/essays/the-anxieties-of-big-data/> [accessed 26 December 2014].


Anyone know the table location of the user group definitions.
The user group names are in LOOKUP.
Group memberships are stored in the user's encrypted security fields (where the passwords are stored), and aren't available via just looking at the data with a SQL query.


Joseph's Coat is a shopper's paradise in Peterborough, New Hampshire for those who value quality handcrafted items and their stories.
We think small and local in a global way -- buying from individuals and small co-ops so the craftspeople directly benefit from the sale of their creations.
We specialize in helping our guests find the perfect gift for themselves and everyone on their list. Whether your budget is $10 or $50, we have thousands of whimsical, practical, decorative and just plain cool things to choose from. Where else can you shop from more than 35 countries?


SORSOGON CITY — The Human Rights group Karapatan Sorsogon demands justice for the Anakpawis member and supporter brutally killed in two separate incidents in the province.
Based on the Fact Finding of the rights group on January 15, Anakpawis member Nicasio Ebio, 37, was killed on January 11 and supporter Hermenegildo Domdom was shot dead the next day, January 12, by riding-in-tandem gunmen allegedly elements of AFP-PNP.
"Duterte administration's mercenaries continuously killing the poor, supporters and members of progressive groups fighting for genuine change," said Guillermo Abraham, Karapatan – Sorsogon spokesperson.
Ebio was shot dead by four motorcycle-riding unidentified gunmen while standing and pleading not to kill him near the village hall in Bgy. Bato, Bacon and left him with 10 gunshot wounds.
"He raised his two hands and said "Do not shoot me, I have many children". But they continued to shoot him until my son fell. Those [residents] who were beside him ran off and left my son. Because maybe they avoided my son so they would not be killed too," Orbeta Ebio, mother of Nicasio, told Baretang Bikolnon Online.
While Anakpawis supporter and construction worker Hermenegildo Domdom was shot dead by two motorcycle-riding unidentified gunmen while heading home for lunch in the road between the boundaries of Bgy. San Ramon and Bgy. Lupe in Prieto Diaz. Hermenegildo has 14 gunshot wounds.
According to Celso, Hermenegildo's brother, he was with two workmates riding in a motorcycle when two motorcycles blocked their way. "Two people suspected that they had 45 caliber waved and commanded them to stop and lay on the ground. Then they started to shoot my brother while the others escaped," he told Baretang Bikolnon Online.
"His forehead was ruined. His brains were all over the road," Celso added.
Hermenegildo's wife, Riza Domasig, is a member of Anakpawis. According to Riza, she and Nicasio attended the Provincial Anakpawis Assembly for the orientation and preparation for the upcoming 2019 Election campaigns last December 8, 2018.
According to Abraham, Duterte regime continuously disregarding the rights of the people and maneuvering to discredit their right to suffrage.


time water bottles oz flip straw inspirational fitness water bottle motivational time measurements goal markers track water intake free non toxic with.
time water bottles material materials bottle trunk stainless steel cover taste polypropylene packing silicone resin in mouth a.
time water bottles oz glass water bottle time marked reusable.
time water bottles clear water bottles.
time water bottles water bottle mommy and lifestyle blogger moms without answers.
time water bottles plastic sports water bottle sport with straw time handle free bottle for water.
time water bottles the good company good time water bottle.
time water bottles large water challenge water bottle personalized fitness workout optional time tracker gym motivation inspiration yoga great gift.
time water bottles time clear water bottle.
time water bottles pink and green water bottle.
time water bottles water bottle tracker motivational water bottle drink your effing water fitness exercise water tracker water reminder.
time water bottles time to hydrate water bottle.
time water bottles water bottle sling re designed in time for summer.


text:
Globe in Talks with STT GDC to Form Joint Venture
PLANS LONG-TERM DATA CENTER EXPANSION
Globe, a Philippine-based digital platform, has signed an exclusivity agreement with ST Telemedia Global Data Centres (STT GDC) to form a joint venture that will enable the carve-out of Globe's data center business (Globe DC) in the Philippines.
Since 2001, Globe has been running its data center portfolios through its wholly-owned subsidiary Innove Communications, Inc. which offers carrier-neutral colocation space, managed security, mission-critical applications and cloud solutions.
According to Globe, its data center facilities currently have a midterm expansion potential of up to 45MW power. The company further believes that a partnership with STT GDC is the next important step that will accelerate its data center growth strategy and market share position in the Philippines, and bolster its plans towards a longer term business development.
"The Philippines is strategically positioned to capture the booming global demand for data centers. Our strong track record and extensive customer reach, together with STT GDC's deep operational expertise, position us well to be a leading data center company in the Philippines," said Ernest L. Cu, President and CEO of Globe.
"Our potential joint venture with STT GDC will therefore be a significant multi-year growth driver for Globe and will further drive our transformation into a digital platform, this time into B2B space, after success of B2C with GCash."
Under the exclusivity agreement, Globe and STT GDC will enter into discussions and aim to sign definitive agreements related to Globe DC. However, there is no certainty that such discussions will lead to definitive transactions.
If successful, the transaction is expected to take the form of a joint venture, in which Globe will remain a significant shareholder while the investment into Globe DC will be consistent with Globe's long-term data center business strategy which include partnering with a leading data center operator to create a top tier data center business in the Philippines and regionally.
globe dc
stt gdc


This recipe for salted butter caramel ice cream is simply delicious, an absolute must for any ice cream lover. It was created by Eric Lanlard and featured on series 2 of Baking Mad with Eric Lanlard on Channel 4.
In a saucepan heat the milk and cream.
Slowly pour in the milk/cream mixture, a little at a time, taking care when pouring as the mixture bubbles up. Mix well until all combined.
In a bowl, whisk the egg yolks and vanilla extract and slowly pour in the cream caramel mixture. Return the mix back into the pan and gently heat to thicken and form a light custard or until it coats the back of a spoon.
Once thickened, pass through a sieve into a bowl and leave to cool.
Once cool, pour the mixture into the ice cream machine bowl and churn for 45-60 minutes. Scoop the ice-cream into a suitable shallow container and put into the freezer to set firmer.
For the spun sugar, put the sugar in a pan and place on the stove to heat. Let the sugar melt gently until it turns into a dark caramel. Take off the heat and leave to cool slightly. Dip a spoon and pull the sugar into thin hair like strands and shape creatively.
To serve, scoop the ice-cream into balls and serve in a dessert glass sprinkled with mini vanilla fudge pieces, some pouring cream and garnish with the spun sugar.


text:
Howard Ronald Drake OBE, CMG (* 13. August 1956) ist ein britischer Diplomat und seit 2010 Hochkommissar in Jamaika.

Von 2005 bis 2009 war Drake britischer Botschafter in Chile. Im Januar 2010 wurde er zum britischen Hochkommissar in Jamaika ernannt und fungierte daneben auch als nicht-residierender Hochkommissar für die Bahamas. Seit 2013 ist er britischer Hochkommissar in Kanada.

Drake ist verheiratet und hat zwei Kinder, einen Sohn und eine Tochter.

Weblinks
 Kurzbiografie auf der Seite des britischen Hochkommissariats in Jamaika

Britischer Botschafter in Chile
Britischer Hochkommissar in Jamaika
Britischer Hochkommissar auf den Bahamas
Officer des Order of the British Empire
Companion des Order of St. Michael and St. George
Brite
Geboren 1956
Mann

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Published 04/23/2019 02:58:17 am at 04/23/2019 02:58:17 am in Tank Steam.
tank steam overview of the integrated system storage tanksteam generator .
marklin br steam locomotive ho scale ebay marklin br tank steam locomotive ho scale ho, romanarmytalk suppose rome built a working steam tank image britsteamtankgif, the cab interior of gw pannier tank steam locomotive no at the cab interior of gw pannier tank steam locomotive no at buckfastleigh on the south devon railway by willig, thomas the tank steam engine youtube thomas the tank steam engine, overview of the integrated system storage tanksteam generator overview of the integrated system storage tanksteam generator , flickriver photoset gwr pannier tank steam train by norbet great western railway pannier tank steam train keighley yorkshire england , hoover twin tank steam mop , idk where to say this but gameplay world of tanks official forum lycopersicon posted january pm, wargaming bring mobile title world of tanks blitz to steam mcv world of tanksjpg, marklin db br steam locomotive ho scale ebay marklin german class tank steam locomotive , tank mixing heating ejectors heaters steam spargers livonia gasjet steam spargers.