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Weinstein charged with sex crimes in LA on eve of NY trial
Los Angeles prosecutors charged Harvey Weinstein on Monday with sexually assaulting two women on successive nights during Oscars week in 2013, bringing the new case against the disgraced Hollywood mogul on the eve of jury selection for his New York trial.
The case, brought by a task force set up by the Los Angeles County district attorney to handle sex-crime allegations against major entertainment figures, now puts Weinstein in deep legal peril on both coasts, where he built his career as the one of the most powerful — and feared — figures in show business before a barrage of allegations from more than 75 women led to his downfall and ignited the .MeToo movement.
Weinstein, 67, was charged with raping a woman at a Los Angeles hotel on Feb. 18, 2013, after pushing his way inside her room, then sexually assaulting a woman in a Beverly Hills hotel suite the next night. He could get up to 28 years in prison on charges of forcible rape, forcible oral copulation, sexual penetration by use of force and sexual battery.
"We see you, we hear you and we believe you"' District Attorney Jackie Lacey said in announcing the charges, addressing herself to the movie producer's accusers.
Los Angeles Police Chief Michel Moore said the charges open the "next chapter" for a man "who has gotten away with too much for too long," while Beverly Hills Chief Sandra Spagnoli called the cases "horrendous crimes perpetrated by a sexual predator."
Lawyers for Weinstein had no immediate response to the new charges, though he has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.
Jury selection is set to begin Tuesday in the New York case, in which Weinstein is charged with raping a woman in a New York City hotel room in 2013 and forcibly performing a sex act on another woman, Mimi Haleyi, in 2006.
He has said any sexual activity was consensual. If convicted of the most serious charges against him in New York, two counts of predatory sexual assault, he faces a mandatory life sentence.
The charges announced Monday on the West Coast took more than two years to file because the women were reluctant to provide all the information necessary, according to Lacey.
The task force is still investigating sex-crime allegations against Weinstein from three women, the district attorney said. Prosecutors declined to bring charges involving three other women because their cases were beyond the statute of limitations.
Weinstein is expected to appear in court in California after his trial in New York is finished, Lacey said. She said prosecutors will recommend $5 million bail.
Lacey, along with the two police chiefs, urged other victims to come forward. "We need the voices of all victims to help us remove sexual predators from our community and protect others from these violent crimes," she said.
The district attorney said the timing of the Los Angeles charges was unrelated to the New York trial. She said the filing and the announcement came on the first business day in which all the necessary people could be gathered.
Neither woman has stepped forward publicly. But one of them is expected to testify in the New York case as part of an effort by prosecutors to portray Weinstein as a sexual predator with a distinct pattern of conduct.
Celebrity attorney Gloria Allred, who represents Haleyi as well as actress Annabella Sciorra, who is scheduled to testify against Weinstein in New York, welcomed the new charges.
""The walls of justice are closing in on Harvey Weinstein. He is now being prosecuted both in New York and Los Angeles," Allred said in a statement, adding: "Women are no longer willing to suffer in silence and are willing to testify under oath in a court of law."
The alleged attacks in Los Angeles County came days before the Hollywood studio boss was photographed on the Oscars red carpet with his fashion designer wife, Georgina Chapman, who was pregnant at the time.
At the 2013 Academy Awards, Weinstein had several major contenders, including "Silver Linings Playbook," "Django Unchained" and "The Master." His movies took home an armful of Oscars, including Jennifer Lawrence's first Academy Award and trophies for director Quentin Tarantino and actor Christoph Waltz.
In a joke that would later turn ominous, when that year's nominees were announced, emcee Seth MacFarlane said after reading the actresses nominated for best supporting actress: "Congratulations, you five ladies no longer have to pretend to be attracted to Harvey Weinstein."
Earlier in the day Monday, Weinstein and several of the women who have accused him converged at a New York City courthouse for final preparations for his trial.
Weinstein's attorneys suggested they knew the additional charges might be coming, asking the judge to sequester the potential jurors because of that possibility. The judge denied the request.
"There is a potential L.A. situation going on," his lawyer, Donna Rotunno, told reporters after the hearing.
Weinstein entered the courthouse using a walker following recent back surgery. When asked outside how his back felt, he responded with a thin smile and a so-so gesture with his hand. "Not so good," he said. "Better."
Inside, his lawyers and prosecutors spent the morning sparring about procedural matters, including how to keep publicity surrounding the trial from influencing the jury's thinking. In a brief hearing, Judge James Burke declined to impose a gag order preventing Weinstein's attorneys from speaking to the media.
Across the street, actresses and other women who say they were sexually harassed or assaulted by Weinstein branded him a villain undeserving of anyone's pity.
"He looked cowardly. He wouldn't look at us. He wouldn't make eye contact," said Sarah Ann Masse, a performer and writer who said Weinstein once sexually harassed her in his underwear during a job interview. "This trial is a cultural reckoning regardless of its legal outcome."
Weinstein's lead lawyer, Donna Rotunno, said she was hopeful a fair jury could be found that wouldn't pre-judge the case. "In this great country, you are innocent until proven guilty," she said outside the courthouse.
Prosecutors wanted jurors to hear from some of the many women who have come forward publicly to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct ranging from harassment to assault. The first allegations were brought to light by The New York Times and The New Yorker in October 2017. Prosecutors got permission from the court to try to buttress their case with four other witnesses: Sciorra and three other accusers who haven't been named.
A list of the final Golden Globe Award winners for film, TV
'Kim's Convenience' will 'always be home,' says new Marvel star Simu Liu

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Suffolk is a distinctive county with its own personality and charm. The largest urban area is the small city of Ipswich, but Felixstowe is the UK's largest container port, providing plenty of employment in the area. Towns include Bury St Edmunds, Newmarket, Stowmarket, Woodbridge, Mildenhall and Brandon. Suffolk is a great place for families, especially as the good education options and quality of life make it a desirable place to live.
There are a large number of new build properties on the market, including houses, flats and apartments in coastal and inland locations such as Saxmundham, Lowestoft, Felixstowe, Haverhill and Bury St Edmunds.
Suffolk has good rail links to the capital in just over an hour from Ipswich. Three major roads, the A11, A12, and A14 also link the county to the rest of the UK.


The Central American River Turtle, Dermatemys mawii, is a large, aquatic freshwater turtle found along the coastal lowlands of southern Mexico, northern Guatemala and Belize. Locally known in Belize as the Hicatee, D. mawii has been intensely harvested for its meat. It has been virtually eliminated from much of its former range in southern Mexico, while its status in Guatemala remains unclear. The lone surviving representative of the family Dermatemydidae, D. mawii, is a unique evolutionary lineage. Classified as Critically Endangered (facing an extremely high risk of extinction) by the IUCN Red List, it is ranked 15th in the report Turtles in Trouble: The World's 25 Most Endangered Tortoises and Freshwater Turtles – 2011, by the Turtle Conservation Coalition.
After a country-wide survey conducted by Dr. Thomas Rainwater to determine the status of the Hicatee in Belize in 2010, the BFREE/Turtle Survival Alliance partnership began to launch a multi-prong conservation effort to halt the decline of the species. Shortly after the field surveys, BFREE and TSA along with the Belize Fisheries Department co-hosted a workshop in December, 2010 that led to the formation of the Hicatee Conservation Network (HCN). TSA approached BFREE during this time and planning began to construct the Hicatee Conservation & Research Center (HCRC) at the field station. The goal was to create an assurance colony and investigate the reproductive biology and feasibility of breeding Hicatee in captivity.
In 2011, construction on the HCRC began and by 2014 ponds were stocked with adult and sub-adult turtles. In tandem with the development of the HCRC, members of the network remained active in their conservation work. Members continue to monitor populations of hicatee throughout the turtle's limited range and implement outreach programs in targeted areas throughout Belize in order to raise awareness of the increasing plight of D.mawii.
A Hicatee Conservation Forum and Workshop was held in February 2016 to review HCN activities and to chart the way forward. During 2017, Richard and Carol Foster completed a natural history documentary on the turtle. The film was used as a centerpiece for an awareness campaign and on October 17, 2017, National Hicatee Day was celebrated for the first time by Belizeans and conservation partners worldwide.
The first hicatee hatchlings at the HCRC.
Rick Hudson, President of the TSA, holding a female subadult Hicatee turtle during a recent visit to the HCRC.
Heather Barrett, Rick Hudson and Jacob Marlin (2016). A Breakout Year for Central American River Turtle Program in Belize. Turtle Survival, 44-45.
Heather Barrett (2015). Hicatee Conservation and Research Center Produces First Hatchlings. Turtle Survival, 36-37. For the entire magazine, see here.
Jacob Marlin and Heather Barrett (2014) Endangered Turtles Find a Home at the New Hicatee Conservation and Research Center in Belize. Turtle Survival. For the entire magazine, see here.
Jacob Marlin (2013) Local Belize Businesses Step Up to Support Hicatee Conservation. Turtle Survival, 47-48. For the entire magazine, see here.
Jacob Marlin (2012) Hicatee Conservation Research Center Takes Shape in Belize. Turtle Survival, 46-47. For the entire magazine, see here.
Thomas Rainwater, Jacob Marlin, Rick Hudson and Steve Platt (2011) Forging Partnerships in Belize to Protect the Hicatee: A Team Building Approach to Conservation. Turtle Survival, 82-85. For the entire magazine, see here.
Thomas Rainwater, Tom Pop, Octavio Cal, Steve Platt, and Rick Hudson (2010) Catalyzing Conservation Action in Belize for Central America's River Turtle. Turtle Survival, 79-82. For the entire magazine, see here.


In special education, it's all about the IEP. An IEP, or Individualized Education Program, is the legally enforceable document meant to ensure that a child is receiving an appropriate education. It is to be carefully crafted, often evaluated, and closely followed. When something goes wrong in creating the IEP, or when the IEP is not implemented, parents have the right to take action against the school district for failing to provide their child with a free and appropriate education.
Each state, and each school district, has some control over how their IEPs look. Here is a blank copy of a New York City IEP. Other states and districts might have very different looking IEPs, like this blank IEP from Florida, but the content is similar.
The IEP is filled out based on a meeting of the child's IEP team. The IDEA also covers who must be at an IEP meeting. Under 1414(d)(3), the IEP team is required to consider a number of things when crafting the IEP, including recent evaluations, but also any parent concerns.
A statement of parent concerns is then included under the section with a child's present level of performance, or PLOP. This section is a powerful tool for parents who are advocating for their children! Check out these great tips about writing a parent concern letter or parent IEP attachment. When parents write a letter or insist that information be included in the IEP, they have a record of what they think their child needs, and evidence that they have been fighting for their child for a while. Don't be afraid to speak up! It's your right.
The Supreme Court has said that, the IEP is "the centerpiece of the [IDEA]'s education delivery system for disabled children." When a piece of paper is so important, it's good to know what's in it!


Home » Post tagged "WhatsApp Voice Call for Windows"
A few weeks ago, WhatsApp started rolling out the voice calling feature to the Android users. It was kind of a surprise as iOS is usually the first one to receive new updates and features. WhatsApp voice call for iOS is also scheduled sometime next week and after that Windows is set to receive this feature.


GED Soul Records owned Friday night at The High Watt with a three punch line up of Magic In Threes , DeRobert & The Half Truths and AJ & The Jiggawatts delivering non-stop danceable James Brown swagger with a DJ mixing up soulful vinyl in-between the sets.
Openers, Magic In Threes set up some psychedelic soul instrumental grooves that show what GED Soul is known for. GED is at the center of a scene that has developed over the last few years after the retro soul show that was on the now defunct or actually format changed WRVU out of Vanderbilt that turned several Belmont University Music program students into late sixties/ early seventies urban soul audiophiles that carried over into bands, original songs and the GED Soul label.
Many of the same musicians play in the three different configurations which isn't much different than back in the Stax days when Booker T & The MG's were the backbone rhythm section to most of the recordings that came out of those Memphis days as well as touring the world as featured in the live DVD of Otis Redding in Europe that captured Steve Cropper and "Duck" Dunn locking lines together.
DeRobert has some solid range and a great deal of dynamics all the way from some Donny Hathaway style ballads to some hard punchy danceable grooves. DeRobert & The Half Truths were one of the main headliners on Record Store Day at The Groove where GED Soul was spinning records all afternoon and it was good to see how DeRobert came across under nightclub lights and a decent PA System.
DeRobert, sonically is ready to go up against any Mark Ronson or Brooklyn Daptone production with a strong voice and solid material like "Beg Me" and "Just Don't Care" off of his Record Store Day EP.
By the end of hour, DeRobert had put his heart and soul into his set and had a towel draped across his shoulder to catch some sweat as needed. DeRobert seemed to capture the biggest chunk of the crowd, but, most stayed around to catch AJ & The Jiggawatts finish up the night.
While AJ may not have the range of DeRobert, he does manage to come across strong as a front man which is a great trait to have when you consider Otis Redding would be in that company. Otis used everything he had and is considered one of the all time greats although he only had about a 3 to 5 note range. AJ stormed through "Hard Times" and "Don't Mess With Me" like it was 1972 all over again and the streets were wide open and there weren't any police cameras and drones to keep the street hustlers in line.
GED Soul brought along plenty of the vinyl only label releases to take home and spin on an Ortofon equipped turntable through a big vintage pair of Altec Lansings pumped up by a Marantz 200 watt per side point to point wired 75 pound amplifier / receiver.
GED Soul shows a strong Nashville representation of what goes all the way back to Jefferson Street and the days of classic soul. What would be good to see is a mash up recording of somebody like AJ and Nashville's Queen of The Blues, Marion James to really stir up some retro real sounds.


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More Research of Price Expectations Needed Now: Essential in enabling Japan to end deflation
SHIMIZUTANI Satoshi
Consulting Fellow, RIETI
In November 2009, the government announced that the Japanese economy was in moderate deflation. This is the second time this century that Japan has dipped into deflation, coming three and a half years after the last deflation period that continued from March 2001 through June 2006. Taking a broader view, however, it would be fair to say that the Japanese economy has been in a continuous spell of deflation since the mid-1990s. The annual growth rate of Japan's consumer price index (CPI), measured by the general index excluding fresh foods, remained negative or around zero throughout those years except for 1997 when the consumption tax rate was raised and 2008 when crude oil prices soared. According to my estimates, the CPI growth rate contains an upward bias of slightly less than 1 percentage point on average because quality improvements in products, i.e. effective declines in prices, are not fully reflected in CPI figures. With this taken into account, the downward trend of prices has been continuing for about 15 years.
Unlike in the Great Depression, a huge price fall of tens of percent has not been observed in the ongoing deflation period, which is just as mild as the previous one. However, current deflation is also different from the previous one in that this time around we have not seen a string of bank failures resulting from a serious aggravation of the problem of bad loans. Thus, very few point to the possibility of Japan being in "debt-deflation," a process in which deflation causes more deflation, as defined by Irving Fisher. But there has been an active debate on whether the introduction of inflation targeting and the use of non-traditional monetary policy tools are effective as a means to fight deflation.
In the previous deflation period, heated debates occurred from time to time over the cause of the deflation and policy responses. However, as a prerequisite to get the right prescription for deflation, it is necessary to fully understand, either theoretically or empirically, a mechanism by which price expectations are formed, and the impact of such expectations on the real economy. The expected rate of price increase (expected inflation), which reflects people's expectations about changes in the price level over a period of time in the future, varies significantly across economic entities and depends on the period covered. In any case, however, a change in the expected inflation leads to a change in the real interest rate even if the nominal interest rate remains unchanged, thereby having a significant impact on the real economy including household consumption and capital investments.
Deflation expectations - i.e. when the expected inflation is negative - lead to an increase in the real interest rate and effective debt burden, which would negatively impact the economy by inducing the postponement of durable goods purchases and cause an effective transfer of income from entities with net liabilities to those with net assets. The expected inflation increase also affects the actual rate of price increase through wage and price setting decisions.
Furthermore, it affects a central bank's function of stabilizing prices. A situation in which the expected rate of price increase is relatively stable over a medium- to long-term time horizon is described as being "well-anchored" and fosters strong public confidence in the central bank. On the other hand, when the expected inflation is unstable, the central bank's price stabilization function does not work properly.
In an attempt to explain the mechanism of how price expectations are formed, various theories, including traditional rational expectations models, have been developed. And many empirical studies have been put forward overseas to verify whether such a mechanism is actually functional and whether there exist conditions for the mechanism to function in reality. In Japan, however, quite often accumulated data and empirical evidence is insufficient to support economic policies in general. Price expectations are no exception and at the time of the previous deflation period, policy discussions were often predicated on the assumption that the expected inflation is equal to the current inflation.
Needless to say, "expectations" for future prices are not visible and the inflation expectation must be measured in some way. While some methods have been developed to fulfill this need (see Shimizutani, S. Kitai to Fukakujitsusei no Keizaigaku [Economics of Expectations and Uncertainty] for details), many attempts have been made overseas to determine the expected inflation based on data collected through surveys of households and corporations. In the United States, a group led by the University of Michigan has been collecting and measuring data on households since the 1960s, which has been used to identify the expectations formation mechanism and served as a reference for policy implementation. In Japan, efforts have been made since 2000 to quantitatively measure the expected inflation.
One such attempt, in which the expected inflation over a short-term time horizon was measured in the midst of the previous deflation period, is a monitor survey on citizens' lifestyles ( Kokumin Seikatsu Monita Chosa ) conducted by the Cabinet Office. The figure shows quarterly changes in the expected inflation from June 2001 through March 2004. In this survey, respondents were asked to provide specific figures as to how much they thought the prices of daily commodities had changed from a year before and will likely change in the next year.
The figure shows that the current rate of price change as perceived by survey respondents (perceived inflation) moved closely in tandem with the CPI growth rate, indicating that households accurately grasp the actual movement of prices. Meanwhile, the expected inflation was slightly negative in 2001 and 2002 as if confirming that the Japanese economy was in mild deflation, but suddenly rose to 1% in the January-March quarter of 2003. Subsequently, the expected inflation dipped but rose to slightly below 1% in the January-March quarter of 2004. Those findings from the survey are subject to bias because respondents were not selected at random. However, its innovative approach of directly asking households, in the sample quantitative questions, about their expected price changes has since been adopted in other surveys including the Monthly Consumer Confidence Survey by the Cabinet Office and the Opinion Survey on the General Public's Views and Behavior by the Bank of Japan (BOJ).
Expected Inflation in Japan
Note: Created by the author based on the research paper co-authored with Masahiro Hori published in International Economics and Economic Policy , vol. 2, 2005
Now, what factors determine such changes in people's price expectations? Determinants for the expected inflation includes the current rate of price increase as perceived at present (adaptive expectations), the expected inflation as perceived in the past (expectations inertia), income, and exogenous factors such as the monetary policy and the outbreak of a global incident. Joint research conducted by Masahiro Hori of the Cabinet Office and myself found that changes in the expected inflation can be partially explained by adaptive expectations and expectations inertia.
Meanwhile, when the central bank changed its monetary policy, only a small percentage of households changed their expected inflation even if they were aware of the policy change. However, those who did revise price expectations raised their expected rate of price increase by nearly 1 percentage point each when the BOJ introduced quantitative easing in March 2001 and when the central bank began considering purchasing asset-backed securities in 2003. Their expected inflation increase also rose by 1.2 percentage points in response to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S., and 1.4 percentage points in response to the subsequent outbreak of the Iraq War in 2003. It is inferred that these incidents caused a huge shock to households' price expectations probably due to their memory of the oil shocks in the past. The jump in the expected inflation in early 2003 can be almost entirely explained by the outbreak of the Iraq War.
A drastic change in the foreign exchange rate can be cited as an example of exogenous shocks that affected households' price expectations. According to joint research conducted by Tatsuhiro Yogi of the Bank of the Ryukyus and myself, the Nixon Shock in 1971, which resulted in a depreciation of the U.S. dollar by 17% against the yen, pushed up the expected inflation by an estimated 4% to 5% in pre-reversion Okinawa, where the U.S. dollar was the currency in use at the time.
Thus, the expected inflation, while being subject to impacts through diverse channels, is strongly affected by an exogenous shock. A change in the monetary policy is no exception. Even though simply being aware of a policy change did not result in a meaningful change in households' price expectations, its impact on those households that revised their expectations was just as large as the impact caused by the 9/11 terrorist attacks or the Iraq War. Therefore, if the government and monetary authorities intend to reverse the ongoing deflationary expectations by means of monetary policy, it is important to take a step that is bold and easy to understand so that as many households as possible will get and understand the message and change their price expectations.
In the joint research with Hori, which also examined the effects of deflationary expectations on households' consumption behavior, it was confirmed that only those with housing loans reduced consumption, postponed the purchase of durable goods, and linked deflationary expectations to anxiety over losing their jobs which resulted in a negative impact on their consumption behavior. Likewise, in the U.S., Frederic S. Mishkin, a professor at Columbia University, showed that the impact of the Great Depression on household purchases of durable goods and houses varied depending on the amount of financial assets or liabilities held.
Empirical findings discussed in this article concern just the mechanism in which households form their short-term price expectations. Efforts have been made to collect data on companies' expected rate of price increase, for instance, through the Cabinet Office's Annual Survey of Corporate Behavior. But companies' expectations are even more difficult to measure quantitatively than households' expectations. Fortunately, however, Japan's efforts to collect and accumulate data on the expected inflation have progressed since the previous deflation period. By actively utilizing these data, we should accumulate knowledge and understanding of the mechanism for the formation of price expectations and then proceed to make policy debates based on such knowledge and understanding. Now is the time to make strenuous efforts so as to enable Japan to have meaningful policy debates, develop an effective "exit" policy, and derive valuable lessons from the ongoing deflation.
>> Original text in Japanese
* Translated by RIETI.
March 24, 2010 Nihon Keizai Shimbun
Article(s) by this author
Future of Japan's Long-term Care Insurance Program
September 2, 2013[RIETI Report]
July 30, 2013[Column]
May 18, 2010[Newspapers & Magazines]
Probing the Issue of Health Disparities:
High correlation with income and education - Policies based on the premise of homogeneity should be reconsidered
September 8, 2009[Newspapers & Magazines]
Bank Recapitalization in the West - Lessons from Japan
February 4, 2009[Newspapers & Magazines]
Gödel's Money : The future of freedom and civilization
Keizai Sangyo Journal
METI Web Site
Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry, IAA (JCN 6010005005426)
JCN: Japan Corporate Number
Opinions expressed or implied on this website are solely those of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views of the Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
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http://texasinsider.org/articles/smashes-expectations-with-largest-single-quarter-of-economic-growth-in-history
Trump Economy Does the Impossible: Smashes Largest Single Quarter of Economic Growth Record in History
by: Gilbert Rodriguez
Source: texasinsider
President Trump gives a Thumbs Up during a Make America Great Again Rally by N/A is licensed under N/A
Congressman Kevin Brady, House Ways abnd Means Committee
"After Covid-19 devastated America's strong economy almost overnight, the Trump economy did the impossible – it battled back with the largest single quarter of economic growth in America's history."
Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON, D.C. — The top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee Kevin Brady (right, R-TX) released the following statement in response to the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimate for GDP growth for the third quarter of 2020:
"After Covid-19 devastated America's strong economy almost overnight, the Trump economy did the impossible – it battled back with the largest single quarter of economic growth in America's history. This smashes expectations, beating economists' original growth estimates by a stunning 400 percent.
"We still have a ways to go in our recovery, and there is no question Speaker Pelosi is working to sabotage America's economy ahead of the election. But look at the contrast -- the worst economic recovery in our lifetimes under Obama-Biden, the strongest labor market recovery from an economic crisis under President Trump.
"Who do you trust to rebuild America's economy? Biden, who pledges to raise your taxes, destroy energy jobs, and drive American manufacturing jobs overseas as he already did? Or President Trump, who cut taxes, raised paychecks, created 500,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs, and lifted 2.5 million Americans out of poverty?
"The President and House Republicans will continue to fight for workers as our economy rebuilds."
Note: Real gross domestic product (GDP) grew at an annual rate of 33.1 percent in the third quarter of 2020, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Economists originally only expected GDP to rise around 6.2 percent in the third quarter, according to the Wall Street Journal.
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Maggie's career in City, State and Federal government fueled her passion for making information easy-to-understand and actionable. That passion, along with an amazing team, enabled her to conceive of and launch PolicyMap in 2008. Maggie has a degree in Economics from St. Joseph's University and a Master's in Governmental Administration from the University of Pennsylvania.
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Signed, hope all goes well.
@dirtworks911: I don't see the point of 27.5 inch wheels in this day and age. It's obvious that 29ers are faster, and in my experience 27.5 just rides like a sluggish 26. Why not offer 29ers for racing and 26ers for people who want something maneuverable or are perhaps a bit shorter?
Well done! you'll get them next time.
Pinkbike...still motoring on into oblivion.
'Luca Shaw is the fastest rider in the world right now." A very bold statement indeed, and one which doesn't quite add up at present. Great photo epic though.


Wandsworth Carers' Centre has free services to support unpaid Carers in their caring role and to help them to have a life outside of caring – e.g. information and advice, benefits checks, peer support groups, counselling, complementary therapies, back care and lots more. For more information, call 020 8877 1200, email info@wandsworthcarers.org.uk or visit www.carerswandsworth.org.uk.


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The dotCommunist Manifesto
Eben Moglen*
A Spectre is haunting multinational capitalism--the spectre of free information. All the powers of ``globalism'' have entered into an unholy alliance to exorcize this spectre: Microsoft and Disney, the World Trade Organization, the United States Congress and the European Commission.
Where are the advocates of freedom in the new digital society who have not been decried as pirates, anarchists, communists? Have we not seen that many of those hurling the epithets were merely thieves in power, whose talk of ``intellectual property'' was nothing more than an attempt to retain unjustifiable privileges in a society irrevocably changing? But it is acknowledged by all the Powers of Globalism that the movement for freedom is itself a Power, and it is high time that we should publish our views in the face of the whole world, to meet this nursery tale of the Spectre of Free Information with a Manifesto of our own.
Owners and Creators
Throughout the world the movement for free information announces the arrival of a new social structure, born of the transformation of bourgeois industrial society by the digital technology of its own invention.
The history of all hitherto existing societies reveals a history of class struggles.
Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, bourgeois and proletarian, imperialist and subaltern, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that has often ended, either in a revolutionary re-constitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.
The industrial society that sprouted from the worldwide expansion of European power ushering in modernity did not do away with class antagonisms. It but established new classes, new conditions of oppression, new forms of struggle in place of the old ones. But the epoch of the bourgeoisie simplified the class antagonisms. Society as a whole seemed divided into two great hostile camps, into two great classes, directly facing each other: Bourgeoisie and Proletariat.
But revolution did not by and large occur, and the ``dictatorship of the proletariat,'' where it arose or claimed to arise, proved incapable of instituting freedom. Instead, capitalism was enabled by technology to secure for itself a measure of consent. The modern laborer in the advanced societies rose with the progress of industry, rather than sinking deeper and deeper below the conditions of existence of his own class. Pauperism did not develop more rapidly than population and wealth. Rationalized industry in the Fordist style turned industrial workers not into a pauperized proletariat, but rather into mass consumers of mass production. Civilizing the proletariat became part of the self-protective program of the bourgeoisie.
In this way, universal education and an end to the industrial exploitation of children became no longer the despised program of the proletarian revolutionary, but the standard of bourgeois social morality. With universal education, workers became literate in the media that could stimulate them to additional consumption. The development of sound recording, telephony, moving pictures, and radio and television broadcasting changed the workers' relationship to bourgeois culture, even as it profoundly altered the culture itself.
Music, for example, throughout previous human history was an acutely perishable non-commodity, a social process, occurring in a place and at a time, consumed where it was made, by people who were indistinctly differentiated as consumers and as makers. After the adoption of recording, music was a non-persishable commodity that could be moved long distances and was necessarily alienated from those who made it. Music became, as an article of consumption, an opportunity for its new ``owners'' to direct additional consumption, to create wants on the part of the new mass consuming class, and to drive its demand in directions profitable to ownership. So too with the entirely new medium of the moving picture, which within decades reoriented the nature of human cognition, capturing a substantial fraction of every worker's day for the reception of messages ordering additional consumption. Tens of thousands of such advertisements passed before the eyes of each child every year, reducing to a new form of serfdom the children liberated from tending a productive machine: they were now compulsorily enlisted in tending the machinery of consumption.
Thus the conditions of bourgeois society were made less narrow, better able to comprise the wealth created by them. Thus was cured the absurd epidemic of recurrent over-production. No longer was there too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce.
But the bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air.
With the adoption of digital technology, the system of mass consumer production supported by mass consumer culture gave birth to new social conditions out of which a new structure of class antagonism precipitates.
The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation. The cheap prices of its commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians' intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt its culture and its principles of intellectual ownership; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilisation into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves. In one word, it creates a world after its own image. But the very instruments of its communication and acculturation establish the modes of resistance which are turned against itself.
Digital technology transforms the bourgeois economy. The dominant goods in the system of production--the articles of cultural consumption that are both commodities sold and instructions to the worker on what and how to buy--along with all other forms of culture and knowledge now have zero marginal cost. Anyone and everyone may have the benefit of all works of culture: music, art, literature, technical information, science, and every other form of knowledge. Barriers of social inequality and geographic isolation dissolve. In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of people. And as in material, so also in intellectual production. The intellectual creations of individual people become common property. Modern bourgeois society with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer's apprentice, who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.
With this change, man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind. Society confronts the simple fact that when everyone can possess every intellectual work of beauty and utility--reaping all the human value of every increase of knowledge--at the same cost that any one person can possess them, it is no longer moral to exclude. If Rome possessed the power to feed everyone amply at no greater cost than that of Caesar's own table, the people would sweep Caesar violently away if anyone were left to starve. But the bourgeois system of ownership demands that knowledge and culture be rationed by the ability to pay. Alternative traditional forms, made newly viable by the technology of interconnection, comprising voluntary associations of those who create and those who support, must be forced into unequal competition with ownership's overwhelmingly powerful systems of mass communication. Those systems of mass communication are in turn based on the appropriation of the people's common rights in the electromagnetic spectrum. Throughout the digital society the classes of knowledge workers--artists, musicians, writers, students, technologists and others trying to gain in their conditions of life by copying and modifying information--are radicalized by the conflict between what they know is possible and what the ideology of the bourgeois compels them to accept. Out of that discordance arises the consciousness of a new class, and with its rise to self-consciousness the fall of ownership begins.
The advance of digital society, whose involuntary promoter is the bourgeoisie, replaces the isolation of the creators, due to competition, by their revolutionary combination, due to association. Creators of knowledge, technology, and culture discover that they no longer require the structure of production based on ownership and the structure of distribution based on coercion of payment. Association, and its anarchist model of propertyless production, makes possible the creation of free software, through which creators gain control of the technology of further production.[1] The network itself, freed of the control of broadcasters and other bandwidth owners, becomes the locus of a new system of distribution, based on association among peers without hierarchical control, which replaces the coercive system of distribution for all music, video, and other soft goods. Universities, libraries, and related institutions become allies of the new class, interpreting their historic role as distributors of knowledge to require them to offer increasingly complete access to the knowledge in their stewardship to all people, freely. The liberation of information from the control of ownership liberates the worker from his imposed role as custodian of the machine. Free information allows the worker to invest her time not in the consumption of bourgeois culture, with its increasingly urgent invitations to sterile consumption, but in the cultivation of her mind and her skills. Increasingly aware of her powers of creation, she ceases to be a passive participant in the systems of production and consumption in which bourgeois society entrapped her.
But the bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his ``natural superiors,'' and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous ``cash payment.'' It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value. And in place of the numberless and feasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom--Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.
Against the forthcoming profound liberation of the working classes, whose access to knowledge and information power now transcends their previous narrow role as consumers of mass culture, the system of bourgeois ownership therefore necessarily contends to its very last. With its preferred instrument of Free Trade, ownership attempts to bring about the very crisis of over-production it once feared. Desperate to entrap the creators in their role as waged consumers, bourgeois ownership attempts to turn material deprivation in some parts of the globe into a source of cheap goods with which to bribe back into cultural passivity not the barbarians, but its own most prized possession--the educated technological laborers of the most advanced societies.
At this stage the workers and creators still form an incoherent mass scattered over the whole globe, and remain broken up by their mutual competition. Now and then the creators are victorious, but only for a time. The real fruit of their battles lies, not in the immediate result, but in the ever-expanding union. This union is helped on by the improved means of communication that are created by modern industry and that place the workers and creators of different localities in contact with one another. It was just this contact that was needed to centralise the numerous local struggles, all of the same character, into one national struggle between classes. But every class struggle is a political struggle. And that union, to attain which the burghers of the Middle Ages, with their miserable highways, required centuries, the modern knowledge workers, thanks to the network, achieve in a few years.
Freedom and Creation
Not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons--the digital working class--the creators. Possessed of skills and knowledges that create both social and exchange value, resisting reduction to the status of commodity, capable collectively of producing all the technologies of freedom, such workmen cannot be reduced to appendages of the machine. Where once bonds of ignorance and geographical isolation tied the proletarian to the industrial army in which he formed an indistinguishable and disposable component, creators collectively wielding control over the network of human communications retain their individuality, and offer the value of their intellectual labor through a variety of arrangements more favorable to their welfare, and to their freedom, than the system of bourgeois ownership ever conceded them.
But in precise proportion to the success of the creators in establishing the genuinely free economy, the bourgeoisie must reinforce the structure of coercive production and distribution concealed within its supposed preference for ``free markets'' and ``free trade.'' Though ultimately prepared to defend by force arrangements that depend on force, however masked, the bourgeoisie at first attempts the reimposition of coercion through its preferred instrument of compulsion, the institutions of its law. Like the ancien régime in France, which believed that feudal property could be maintained by conservative force of law despite the modernization of society, the owners of bourgeois culture expect their law of property to provide a magic bulwark against the forces they have themselves released.
At a certain stage in the development of the means of production and of exchange, the conditions under which feudal society produced and exchanged, the feudal organisation of agriculture and manufacturing industry, in one word, the feudal relations of property became no longer compatible with the already developed productive forces; they became so many fetters. They had to be burst asunder; they were burst asunder.
Into their place stepped free competition, accompanied by a social and political constitution adapted to it, and by the economic and political sway of the bourgeois class. But ``free competition'' was never more than an aspiration of bourgeois society, which constantly experienced the capitalists' intrinsic preference for monopoly. Bourgeois property exemplified the concept of monopoly, denying at the level of practical arrangements the dogma of freedom bourgeois law inconsistently proclaimed. As, in the new digital society, creators establish genuinely free forms of economic activity, the dogma of bourgeois property comes into active conflict with the dogma of bourgeois freedom. Protecting the ownership of ideas requires the suppression of free technology, which means the suppression of free speech. The power of the State is employed to prohibit free creation. Scientists, artists, engineers and students are prevented from creating or sharing knowledge, on the ground that their ideas imperil the owners' property in the system of cultural production and distribution. It is in the courts of the owners that the creators find their class identity most clearly, and it is there, accordingly, that the conflict begins.
But the law of bourgeois property is not a magic amulet against the consequences of bourgeois technology: the broom of the sorcerer's apprentice will keep sweeping, and the water continues to rise. It is in the domain of technology that the defeat of ownership finally occurs, as the new modes of production and distribution burst the fetters of the outmoded law.
All the preceding classes that got the upper hand, sought to fortify their already acquired status by subjecting society at large to their conditions of appropriation. Knowledge workers cannot become masters of the productive forces of society, except by abolishing their own previous mode of appropriation, and thereby also every other previous mode of appropriation. Theirs is the revolutionary dedication to freedom: to the abolition of the ownership of ideas, to the free circulation of knowledge, and the restoration of culture as the symbolic commons that all human beings share.
To the owners of culture, we say: You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property in ideas. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine-tenths of the population. What they create is immediately appropriated by their employers, who claim the fruit of their intellect through the law of patent, copyright, trade secret and other forms of ``intellectual property.'' Their birthright in the electromagnetic spectrum, which can allow all people to communicate with and learn from one another, freely, at almost inexhaustible capacity for nominal cost, has been taken from them by the bourgeoisie, and is returned to them as articles of consumption--broadcast culture, and telecommunications services--for which they pay dearly. Their creativity finds no outlet: their music, their art, their storytelling is drowned out by the commodities of capitalist culture, amplified by all the power of the oligopoly of ``broadcasting,'' before which they are supposed to remain passive, consuming rather than creating. In short, the property you lament is the proceeds of theft: its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence in the hands of everyone else. You reproach us, therefore, with intending to do away with a form of property, the necessary condition for whose existence is the non-existence of any such property for the immense majority of society.
It has been objected that upon the abolition of private property in ideas and culture all creative work will cease, for lack of ``incentive,'' and universal laziness will overtake us.
According to this, there ought to have been no music, art, technology, or learning before the advent of the bourgeoisie, which alone conceived of subjecting the entirety of knowledge and culture to the cash nexus. Faced with the advent of free production and free technology, with free software, and with the resulting development of free distribution technology, this argument simply denies the visible and unanswerable facts. Fact is subordinated to dogma, in which the arrangements that briefly characterized intellectual production and cultural distribution during the short heyday of the bourgeoisie are said, despite the evidence of both past and present, to be the only structures possible.
Thus we say to the owners: The misconception that induces you to transform into eternal laws of nature and of reason, the social forms springing from your present mode of production and form of property--historical relations that rise and disappear in the progress of production--this misconception you share with every ruling class that has preceded you. What you see clearly in the case of ancient property, what you admit in the case of feudal property, you are of course forbidden to admit in the case of your own bourgeois form of property.
Our theoretical conclusions are in no way based on ideas or principles that have been invented, or discovered, by this or that would-be universal reformer. They merely express, in general terms, actual relations springing from an existing class struggle, from a historical movement going on under our very eyes.
When people speak of ideas that revolutionise society, they do but express the fact, that within the old society, the elements of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old conditions of existence.
We, the creators of the free information society, mean to wrest from the bourgeoisie, by degrees, the shared patrimony of humankind. We intend the resumption of the cultural inheritance stolen from us under the guise of ``intellectual property,'' as well as the medium of electromagnetic transportation. We are committed to the struggle for free speech, free knowledge, and free technology. The measures by which we advance that struggle will of course be different in different countries, but the following will be pretty generally applicable:
Abolition of all forms of private property in ideas.
Withdrawal of all exclusive licenses, privileges and rights to use of electromagnetic spectrum. Nullification of all conveyances of permanent title to electromagnetic frequencies.
Development of electromagnetic spectrum infrastructure that implements every person's equal right to communicate.
Common social development of computer programs and all other forms of software, including genetic information, as public goods.
Full respect for freedom of speech, including all forms of technical speech.
Protection for the integrity of creative works.
Free and equal access to all publicly-produced information and all educational material used in all branches of the public education system.
By these and other means, we commit ourselves to the revolution that liberates the human mind. In overthrowing the system of private property in ideas, we bring into existence a truly just society, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.
* Professor of Law, Columbia University Law School.
1 The free software movement has used programmers throughout the world--paid and unpaid--since the early 1980s to create the GNU/Linux operating system and related software that can be copied, modified and redistributed by all its users. This technical environment, now ubiquitous and competitively superior to the proprietary software industry's products, frees computer users from the monopolistic form of technological control that was to have dominated the personal computer revolution as capitalism envisioned it. By displacing the proprietary production of the most powerful monopoly on earth, the free software movement shows that associations of digital workers are capable of producing better goods, for distribution at nominal cost, than capitalist production can achieve despite the vaunted ``incentives'' created by ownership and exclusionary ``intellectual property'' law.
©Eben Moglen, 2003 Send a comment PostScript PDF


text:
require 'test_helper'

class Thinreports::Core::Shape::TextBlock::Formatter::TestBasic < Minitest::Test
  include Thinreports::TestHelper

  # Alias
  Formatter = Thinreports::Core::Shape::TextBlock::Formatter::Basic

  def test_apply_simple_format
    format = stub(format_base: 'Hello {value}!')

    assert_equal Formatter.new(format).apply('Thinreports'),
                 'Hello Thinreports!'
  end

  def test_apply_multiple_format
    format = stub(format_base: 'Hello {value}! And good bye {value}.')

    assert_equal Formatter.new(format).apply('Thinreports'),
                 'Hello Thinreports! And good bye Thinreports.'
  end
end

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Read Unit 77: Broken to find out!
Apple link will be coming soon!
Unit 77 is a cyborg…but he used to be so much more. Tortured by glimpses of his past, former Captain Andrew Fischer goes through his days in a metallic nightmare, feeling broken inside though he doesn't know why.
Doctor Claudia Chambers is distraught. After a land mine blew up Drew Fischer and his unit of elite Space Corps Marines, she was forced to implant the CyBRG device in all of them which turned the men into machines. But she keeps catching glimpses of humanity from the supposedly inhuman Captain…could it be that part of Drew is still in there, longing to get out? Claudia is almost afraid to hope–she loved Drew once and thought he might return the feelings. But how can a woman love a machine?
Hey, do you know my awesome co-author Mina Carter?
If not check her out! Everyone who signs up for her newsletter gets 2 juicy free ebooks, Mated by Midsummer and Her Empath!


text:
Whisky reviews, news & features without favour
Scoring Bands
Whyte & Mackay Blended Scotch Whisky
by Mark January 11, 2016 February 16, 2016
We do like a good blended whisky here on Malt. (Have a read of this interview with whisky legend Charles MacLean on blended Scotch.)
Cheap blends are often looked down-upon, particularly if you're just starting to explore single malts, but they do provide the backbone of the whisky industry. And that's why I like to cover them here, too. It's all right reviewing whiskies worth hundreds and, on occasion, thousands of pounds, but that's not much good for the majority of whisky drinkers. Particularly after Christmas, when everyone is scratching around for spare change in the sofa in order to make it to payday.
Of cheap blended Scotch, so far I've looked at Bell's Original, Teacher's Highland Cream, and the Famous Grouse. They were all very mild an inoffensive.
And now it's time to look at another of the UK's major blends – Whyte & Mackay Blended Scotch Whisky.
The company, Whyte & Mackay, has been around a long time. Since 1844. Based in Glasgow, its brands make up around 3% of the UK whisky market. It's very sought after by corporations, too, and has changed owners quite a few times in recent years. Now it's owned by a Philippines firm, Emperador, who bought it for a cool £430m. Whyte & Mackay is also the 26th largest blended Scotch brand worldwide.
Their master blender is Richard Paterson, who knows a thing or two about putting good whiskies together. He's released some astonishing The Dalmore whiskies, and some – in my opinion – not so good Jura whiskies (I just can't get excited about that spirit). They also own Fettercairn and Tamnavulin, as well as the gargantuan Invergordon single grain distillery.
The Whyte & Mackay Special Blend – the core of their range – is 'triple matured'. First is the standard maturation of individual single malts. They're then brought together and married in sherry casks, where they're matured for a further few months. Then aged grain whiskies are added, where the new blend of whisky matures a little longer. In total, 41 different whiskies are used to make up the blend.
You can pick bottles of this up very cheaply indeed. Small bottles for less than £10 in many places, such as your local supermarket. Although rather bizarrely I won this in a raffle, so it didn't cost me anything.
Colour: deep copper. I think we can forgive blends for adding caramel colouring, largely for consistency, but interesting to note that it is darker than Bell's or Famous Grouse.
On the nose: quite confident, creamy, vanilla custard, flashes of dried fruits. Malty. Like a bowl of porridge with a lot of heather honey stirred into it.
In the mouth: flavour! Quite a bit actually. Sweet: dried fruits, molasses or maple syrup. A little bit of woodiness in there too. Malted Milk biscuits. The burnt sugar crust on a crème brûlée There's something very dark rum-like about it, too. Yes, it's not complex, not even close, but there's plenty going on. Compared to Bell's or Famous Grouse, it's far more flavoursome. And as with many blends, there's good texture to the spirit.
I think because this last year I've become more a fan of sherried style whiskies than peated whiskies, this one ticks my box. If you're not a fan of that sweetness then it may not be for you. I can imagine this going one of two ways. If you're totally new to whisky, perhaps Bell's – being more mellow and dialling down the flavours – might be the better bet. Whyte & Mackay just has far more flavour, and isn't shy about it either.
Anyway, of the cheapest UK blended whiskies, I think this is the tastiest. Just don't go expecting your knees to quiver and your spine to tingle when you take a sip.
CategoriesBlends
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I work as Head of Communications for Waterford Distillery and Renegade Rum Distillery. I've written about (and reviewed) whisky for Whisky Magazine, among other publications, and have been a whisky judge for competitions including the World Whiskies Awards. I've done other writing too: several mass market genre novels, a few short stories, including for BBC Radio 4. Follow me on Instagram.com/MrMarkNewton/ or Twitter.com/MrMarkNewton.
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jack noble says:
so very interesting off to buy a bottle
John Walker says:
Couldn't agree more. This is my go to whisky when the budget is tight. For me it beats bell's, teachers, grouse by a margin.
Totally agree. This mainstream mixed blend whisky is my go to when budget is tight. I can honestly sip this spirit and appreciate it. Although working previously within a background of whisky tasting I can honestly say I will never show any depreciation to any distillery of whisky as whisky to me is such a diverse art that will never dwindle. There is no such thing as a bad scotch single malt, mixed blend. There is no such thing as a bad Irish whiskey, Japanese whiskey or even American whiskey in other words a bourbon. It's all about personal preference down to one's taste pallete. Which in turn brings diversity to the spirit. One day I wish to take myself on the trail of Scotland to embark on the next chapter of my quest in the art of whisky making.
Ian Murie says:
An easy tipple to enjoy and I do.
I only tasted it in a new local recently and was pleasantly surprised.
I don't understand 2 lions though?
Hi Nick – thanks for stopping by! It's very difficult to find a bad whisky, I agree. (Although some like the Fujikai 10 are pretty poor and weird!) And there is personal preference involved, although I would say that some whiskies are better assembled than others, some are rip-offs for what's gone in, some show the use of poor casks. So whilst it's all good, there are levels of goodness if there's criteria around it – if you see what I mean.
"There is no such thing as bad whisky. Some whiskys just happen to be better than others."
– William Faulkner
Adrienne Edwards says:
Having drunk W & M for years I think I'm qualified to ask why the bottle we opened last night (Tesco £12.00) smells of cellar steps and tastes fusty. I'd appreciate your comments, please.
Frank Hodson says:
'Whyte and Mackay' is a very decent cheap blended mainstream whisky. I've never been minted, quite the opposite in fact. And since my budget is tighter than ever before, I've decided to look out for serviceable to very good and affordable Blended Malts, and for me 'Whyte and Mackay Blended Scotch' is really quite nice for the asking price. As you say, it's won't blow you away, but it has a decent range of flavours, the sherry hints shine through for me in particular. A good whisky. Though I'd recommend 'Queen Margot 8 Years' and 'Highland Black 8 Years' first, especially as both of these are fantastic blends for the price of £12.99 70cl at my local Lidl and Aldi respectively!
Mahmoud Ali says:
The Whyte and Mackay is indeed one of the tastier blended whiskies. However a recent example of travel retail Grant's has now upped the ante. Recently, at an Asian airport I came across a travel exclusive Grant's called the 'Distillery Edition' and, believe it or not, was bottled at 46.3%. It was only one dollar more than the blended whiskies on the shelf, things like J & B, White Horse, Haig, Whyte and Mackay, etc. so it was not a cynical attempt at fooling people to fork over more money. I have not had a Grant's for many years but from what I recall this Distillery Edition is much better. It is bolder, richer and the added alcohol makes a difference. Grant's is to be congratulated.
It has taken me over 20 years to appreciate Whisky, I'm no expert and certainly struggle with the complex tastes of single malts especially the island variety but have learnt to savour and enjoy some highland, lowland and speyside but only after perseverance and over some considerable time. Whyte & Mackay was a good entry point as the sherry hints to other spirits and is a staple in my drinks cabinet now.
Morrisons currently have a litre on spesh at £15. I mean, you couldn't buy it for that!
As a big fan of honey, fruit, toffee and cream this Speyside-by-the-numbers dram hits the spot every time for me.
Yes, it's not complicated, and you don't get a hugely long finish, but there is lots and lots of flavour even if it isn't multi-dimensional.
At 15 notes for a litre why would t you??
Paul Hurst says:
A nice fully malty taste. Good on the rocks, with soda and if you like mixers then go for it. It stands up to a dab of ginger ale or a slug of cola.
On a Par with the Lidl Glen Orchy Brand for uniqueness and richness.
I love tracking down the tastiest cheap whisky, whiskey and bourbon.
James Hobbs says:
I have been enjoying Whisky for many years, I like a few top of the range blends such as Chivas Regal blend and the Johnny Walker blends. I do like the Islay peaty malts. My favourite malts are Talisker and Oban.
I explained to friends that I could tell the area of Scotland by the taste and I was challenged this week when I glass of Whyte and McKay was given to me. I have never tried it before, but I was immediately impressed by its smooth and fruity taste which tasted better than a cheap blend. I guessed it was a single malt from the West Coast and maybe Oban, I wasn't right but the distillery is only 100 mile south of Oban
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Roy Ayers is an iconic figure. With a career spanning over four decades beginning as jazz vibraphonist, expanding into R&B/funk & disco he is now considered one of the prophets of acid jazz. At 63 years old he is a man always decades ahead of his time.
In 2004 BBE released Virgin Ubiquity, the first in a series of unreleased recordings from the prolific Roy Ayers.
Roys' vault having been opened to label boss BBE Peter Adarkwah has offered up a second albums' worth of previously unreleased precious gems, 'Virgin Ubiquity II'. Over a year has been spent carefully restoring a huge quantity of 2inch reels and after an agonising process of elimination the tracks before you were delivered to Jamie Staub who lovingly mixed each retrieved master, giving a lush warmth to the finished album, rarely heard in the modern era.


Thanks to our users, Nimble has consistently been voted Leader in both CRM and Sales Intelligence Categories over the past four years. We are honored and humbled to announce that Nimble was named both Market Leader and #1 in Customer Satisfaction on G2 Crowd's Winter 2017 rankings.
Each month, more than a half-million people visit G2 Crowd's site to inform better purchasing decisions for their businesses. Technology buyers, investors, and analysts use the site to compare and select the best software based on peer reviews and integrated social data from over 80,000 users.
"Nimble has built the best Operating System for Salespeople — We've combined the best in sales enablement and engagement including simple smart CRM, Sales Intelligence, Email Tracking and Marketing Automation to help companies grow," said Jon Ferrara, CEO of Nimble and founder of the pioneering CRM, GoldMine.
The G2 Grid℠ report on CRM software is an in-depth report of 148 CRM vendors based on reviews from over 4,594 business professionals. Nimble was named CRM and #1 in Satisfaction ahead of Salesforce, Zoho, and Hubspot CRM.
CRM products help companies track and manage sales interactions in a single system. Organizations rely on CRM to record customer information to ensure team members share the same data when they interact with their customers. This type of software is used primarily by salespeople, but also for upper management and support teams.
Nimble was named a High Performer based on receiving a high Customer Satisfaction score and having a large Market Presence. Nimble earned #1 in overall Customer Satisfaction because it was rated well above the competition for Quality of Support, Ease of Use, Meeting Company Requirements, Ease of Administration, Ease of Doing Business With Nimble, and Ease of Setup.
Overall, users were least-satisfied with the Social Collaboration features and Social Network Integration capabilities of CRM products. Nimble has prided itself on being a market pioneer of Social Sales with its numerous social network and data integrations, resulting in Nimble achieving top ranking for Social Collaboration Features and Social Network Integrations. Nimble's integrations with public social networks allow users to obtain critical contact details to inform their sales outreach and customer follow-ups.
The G2 Crowd's CRM Grid SM Report uncovered that CRM users were least satisfied with Social Collaboration (73% avg. rating) and Social Network Integration capabilities (72% avg. rating). Nimble cruised to the top of the rankings for both Social Collaboration and Social Network Integrations.
Overall, users were least-satisfied with the Social Collaboration features and Social Network Integration capabilities of CRM products. Nimble has prided itself on being a market pioneer of Social Sales with its numerous social network and data integrations, resulting in Nimble achieving top ranking for Social Collaboration Features and Social Network Integrations. Nimble's integrations with public social networks allows users to obtain critical contact details to inform their sales outreach and customer follow-ups.
These awards follow recent accolades for Nimble, including: King of CRM by GetApp, #1 in CRM Value, #1 CRM in Customer Satisfaction and CRM Market Leader 3 years in a row by G2 Crowd. Nimble was also recognized previously as #1 Sales Intelligence in Customer Satisfaction and overall High Performer.
Nimble was named #1 CRM in numerous other reviews over the past six months including; #1 CRM for Small Business by TechnologyAdvice, Highest Rated Software by Small, Mid-Size and Enterprise Business Users, Highest Rated CRM, Highest Rated Sales Intelligence, Best Software 2014 and Highest Rated Ease-of-Setup. Nimble was also recognized previously as #1 Sales Intelligence in Customer Satisfaction and overall High Performer.
G2 Crowd is the world's leading business software review platform, leverages more than 80,000 user reviews to drive better purchasing decisions. Technology buyers, investors, and analysts use the site to compare and select the best software based on peer reviews and synthesized social data. Monthly, more than a half-million people visit G2 Crowd's site. G2 Crowd aims to bring authenticity and transparency to business technology research. For more information, go to G2Crowd.com.


Today, biometric applications are used across industries, institutions and government establishments. In many business outfits, it is very crucial for continuity of business operations that biometric systems keep functioning tirelessly. In institutions like hospitals and blood transfusion units, where precise identification of patients and blood / organ donors can be crucial, biometrics eliminates possibility of human errors and expedite overall healthcare operations by streamlining patient identification practice. Biometrics makes use unique physiological and behavioral patterns of human body. These patterns are formed randomly owing to different biological and environmental reasons. Randomness and complexity of details make these patterns good enough to be considered as unique. These biological or behavioral characteristics can be as obvious as facial structure or voice, which can even be recognized and differentiated by human senses, or as unapparent as DNA sequence of vascular structure, which require special equipment and process for identification of an individual.
Despite the sizable difference in different biometric traits, they serve a common purpose: making personal identification possible with biometrics. Biometrics makes use of statistical, mathematical, imaging and computing techniques to uniquely map these patterns for an individual. These patterns are first captured by imaging or scanning and then taken through specialized algorithms to generate a biometric template, which is unique to the individual.
A biometric modality is the type of human trail that a biometric system accepts as input. There are many biological and behavioral patterns in human beings that biometrics can leverage to identify them individually. Biometric modalities can be classified largely in three categories: Physiological, Behavioral and a combination of these two.
These modalities are related with shape and size of the body, for example: fingerprints, hand geometry, facial recognition, retina, DNA, etc.
These modalities pertain to the human behavior which is expected to be consistent over time, for example: signatures, typing rhythm, gait (the way an individual walks). Behavioral patterns of a person develop over time and are believed to remain unchanged during the lifetime. These behavioral patterns can be measured and used to identify the individual.
These modalities depend of physiology as well as human behavior, for example: voice.
Deploying a biometric modality depends on identification or authentication application it is going to be used with, for example: for a low security door access, fingerprint based access does the job, however, for logical access to a high security network server, user might have to authenticate with fingerprints as well as his or her voice print. Biometric authentication application can be implemented using one (unimodal) or more than one (multimodal) approach that makes use of single or multiple biometric modalities respectively. In many online and mobile services, for example, app based mobile banking or financial services application, a comparatively newer approach is used called continuous authentication.
This approach comes out of the logic that a user should be continuously monitored to make sure that the device or application is being used by the genuine user throughout the session. User activity can be tracked by usage pattern monitoring and hardware / sensor data to make sure that device is in right hands. Once a user passes the authentication / verification barrier, there is no way to make sure that it is the same user throughout the session. Continuous authentication solves this problem by leveraging behavioral biometrics that creates a unique user profile depending on usage patterns and device data, user's authentication state can be tracked throughout the session with his unique user profile and access can denied in the middle of a session if any irregularities are detected.
Biometric modalities are extensively used in personal identification and authentication applications. Physiological modalities are comparatively more stable than behavioral ones, and stay unaffected by factors like mood, psychology and fatigue. Fingerprint recognition is one of the popular modalities, which commonly used for application like physical and logical access control, employee identification, attendance and customer identification. Friction ridges on fingertips are commonly called fingerprints and they are one of the popular physiological characteristics that are used for personal identification. Having its roots in forensic applications in the past, fingerprint recognition has gained considerable market penetration and popularity in recent years due to extensive use in consumer electronics like mobile phones and national ID programs. Unlike other biometric methods of identification, fingerprint recognition does not require user to stay steady or wear a specific posture like iris or retina recognition. User just needs to touch the scanning surface of recognition equipment and it is done.
Facial structure is also a physiological modality that can be used for personal identification and authentication. Human facial structure is an individual characteristic. Facial recognition biometrics makes use of this fact to identify and authenticate individuals. Human brains have natural ability to remember and distinguish different faces. We identify and authenticate people just by recognizing their face on a daily basis. We recognize our family, friends, colleagues, neighbors and pets primarily by their facial structure.
Facial recognition system can identify people by processing their digital images if their facial recognition identity has been pre-established. The system takes advantage of digital images or still frames from a video source, which are taken through the facial recognition algorithm. This algorithm extracts data out of facial characteristics like position and shape of eyes, nose, cheekbones and jaw. It can also measure distance between these characteristics and mapped data is stored in a database. This system can be useful in identifying people in crowd like airport terminals, railway stations, etc. Facial recognition systems can capture multiple images in a second, compare them with what is stored in the database and produced results.
Intrusive, subject is require to touch the equipment in order to present a biometric sample. Non-Intrusive, subject is not require to contact the equipment for presenting the biometric sample.
User consent is required. User consent may not be required.
Extensively used in identification and authentication. Extensively used in surveillance and public applications.
High distinctiveness and unique characteristics. Fingerprints do not repeat, not even in twins. Low distinctiveness. Facial characteristics may repeat in people, e.g. in twins.
Subjects cannot be identified from a distance. Subjects can be identified from a distance.
High permanence and stability, very less affected by age. Medium permanence and stability, may get affected by age.
High security and high confidence level. Low security and low confidence level.
Medium collectability. Low exposure due to location of minute details. Highly collectable. Highly exposed due to location of face and larger details.
Requires specific set of hardware and software. Can be completely software based, can make use of existing digital images.
Medium universality: Fingerprint may not be available in some individuals. High universality: Facial features are found in all human beings.
Low potential for circumvention. Not easily spoofable. High potential for circumvention.
Medium level of acceptability. High level of acceptability.
Biometrics has made a significant impact on society in recent years. It is helping people get rid of ID cards, documents, tokens, PINs and passwords, enabling them to prove their identity with their unique physiological or behavioral characteristics. It is also making life better by eliminates need of carrying possessions all the time to prove one's identity. There have been many instances in the past where people were denied access just because they forgot to carry an identity card or particular document to prove their identity.
There have also been instances in which passengers were denied boarding flight just because they could not prove their identity and the airline did not have any biometric recognition method implemented to identify people with their inherent characteristics. Now people do not get access denied just because they do not possess a piece of plastic. Wherever biometric recognition has marked its presence, people go virtually unrestricted by instantly verifying their identity. Denied access on online service is another common incident because people tend to forget their PINs and passwords. Biometrics can also make a difference in online services by providing seamless login experience.
Despite being the part of physiological biometrics, fingerprint recognition considerably differ from facial recognition. Both the recognition methods have their own advantages and disadvantages, but none of them can replace each other. Facial recognition is good in mass surveillance applications at crowded places, while personal identification with user consent is better achieved by fingerprint recognition. Both the recognition methods have been used in law enforcement extensively. Biometrics has been a part of forensics for more than 100 years, while modern mass surveillance is performed with facial recognition systems by various law enforcement and national security agencies.


Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9+ renders have leaked again but this time from a reliable leakster, Evan Blass aka @evleaks.
The image contains both Galaxy S9 and S9+ and they look pretty same as their predecessor Galaxy S8 and S8+. But the bezels at the bottom are now slightly thinner. The back panel of the phones are not visible in this render but Evan Blass has said they are very different from S8. In S9+ the dual cameras will be placed vertically and below the camera panel, the fingerprint sensor will be placed which will be easier to reach, unlike S8+.
Galaxy S9 will sport 5.8-inch Super AMOLED display while the S9+ comes with the slightly larger 6.2-inch display. Both S9 and S9+ will be powered by Snapdragon 845 SoC for the U.S. and Chinese market while rest of the world will get Exynos 9810. S9+ will come with 6GB RAM and 128GB storage while the S9 will get 4GB RAM with 64GB storage just like S8.
Coming to the camera segment, both S9 and S9+ will have 12MP modules with variable aperture from f2.4 to f1.5. The camera will also bring "super slow-mo" which can capture videos up to 720p at 480fps. S9+ will have a secondary 12MP module at the back with fixed aperture. On the front, both the devices will have 8MP snapper to take care of the selfies.
Samsung has already confirmed S9 lineup will be announced at MWC on February 25. The devices are expected to go on sale on March 19.


We carry gift certificates! The perfect gift for the vinyl record collector in your life!
All weekend long we will be having a fantastic sale to help usher in the holiday season. We will be opening Saturday with a traditional spin of Arlo Guthrie's classic Alice's Resaturant. It aso happens to be the 41st anniversary of the legendary concert, The Last Waltz. We will be having a listening party of sorts beginning at 10:30am where we will be playing the entire 6 LP 40th Anniversary box set.
- Great discounts on other used merchandise!


As the son of an artist growing up in Lagrange Park, Illinois, drawing and painting has always been part of Peter's life. Frank Lloyd Wright's houses close to his in nearby Oak Park, IL, influenced his decision to pursue a degree in architecture at Iowa State University.
A trained architect, Peter started migrating towards art by becoming an architectural illustrator, working with Rael Slutsky Associates, and later Manuel Avila associates. Peter loves the technical aspects of drawing perspective images and is drawn to its exactness of detail.
Peter's full transition to artist came while taking classes with Peggy Macnamara at North Shore Art League in Winnetka, Il. Peggy activated his love for loose, fresh watercolor, igniting his current series of work, which overlays a looser, more colorful painting style on top of a tight drawing style.
Peter is a signature member of American Watercolor Society, National Watercolor Society andTransparent Watercolor Society and has won awards from the Transparent Watercolor Society, American Institute of Architectural Illustrators and Illinois Watercolor Society, among others. He is published in Splash 15, 16 and 17, an annual watercolor compilation, and has exhibited in numerous group and individual shows and fairs. He teaches watercolor in group and individual classes.
Peter received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Iowa State University, and associates degree in Illustration from the American Academy of art in Chicago.


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Opinion|New York Leaders Are Failing Its Subway Riders
https://nyti.ms/2EjdMqd
New York Leaders Are Failing Its Subway Riders
By The Editorial Board
Credit...Julianna Brion
Each new revelation about the degradation of New York's subways seems more shocking than the last. But it all comes down to one thing: New York's leaders have failed the millions of people who use the transit system every day.
The latest dismaying detail comes from a report by Brian Rosenthal in The Times, which concludes that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the state agency that runs the subway system, spends far more to build tunnels and extend train lines than agencies doing comparable projects elsewhere. Its construction projects have more workers than those in other cities, and workers are kept on hand even when there is no need for them. Contractors add a premium to their bids, claiming it compensates them for dealing with the M.T.A.'s bureaucracy. And some unions and contractors negotiate wages and work rules without any say from the authority.
Billions of dollars that could have gone to maintaining and improving the subways, which use a signaling system that dates to the 1930s, have been wasted on exorbitant costs. Projects have also been delayed by mismanagement.
Blame for these costs belongs to politically powerful construction companies and labor unions that drive up costs under the lax oversight of public officials who have no incentive to rouse sleeping legislative watchdogs.
Consider the following: The first phase of the Second Avenue subway, completed at the end of 2016, cost $2.5 billion per mile; and the extension of the No. 7 line to Hudson Yards, finished the year before, cost $1.5 billion per mile. By contrast, Paris, a dense and historic city with strong labor unions, is building a line extension similar to the Second Avenue project for just $450 million a mile, which is roughly comparable to the average cost for subway projects around the world. Several transit experts have pointed out these cost discrepancies in recent years.
The M.T.A. chairman, Joe Lhota, acknowledged to The Times that excessive costs have "been a problem," but he says New York has unique challenges, like aging utilities and high density, that contribute to high costs. That is not credible, since Paris and London are older than New York and have done a much better job improving and expanding their transit systems in recent years.
Still, Mr. Lhota, whom Gov. Andrew Cuomo appointed last year, says the M.T.A. is working to bring down costs. To be successful, he will need help from Mr. Cuomo, who has been friendly with the labor unions whose members operate cranes and dig tunnels, and with the contractors doing the work. The unions and the construction companies are big campaign contributors and have a strong financial incentive to preserve the status quo.
Mr. Cuomo, in turn, will have to stir the Legislature, which has, regrettably, taken little interest in overseeing and improving the M.T.A. Besides annual hearings about the M.T.A.'s budget, the State Assembly and the Senate conducted just two oversight hearings on the M.T.A. between 2015 and last year, according to Reinvent Albany, a public interest group. Last year, as the subways were plagued by delays and derailments, the Assembly held just one oversight hearing, about the impact of the track work Amtrak was doing at Penn Station. The Senate did not bother with even that. By contrast, the New York City Council, which has little sway over the M.T.A., has held nine oversight hearings in the past three years.
It's not as if the Legislature has no power. It held important hearings in 2016 about water contamination in Hoosick Falls and elsewhere. Those hearings helped shine a light on how a toxic chemical got into groundwater, and state officials were pressed to explain why they did not respond more quickly.
The state comptroller, Thomas DiNapoli, audits the M.T.A. and other state agencies. His office has examined construction costs for projects like East Side Access, which will bring the Long Island Rail Road to Grand Central Terminal, but it has not compared M.T.A. spending with the spending of agencies in other big cities. The comptroller could do more to expose waste.
Ultimately, Mr. Cuomo and the Legislature need to reform the M.T.A. Lawmakers could require that the authority use the "design-build" process, which puts design and construction teams together early and usually reduces the need for big changes later. The state should also make sure the M.T.A. has a voice in negotiations between contractors and labor unions, to reduce the potential for featherbedding that exists when both sides can pass on costs to the government. If that doesn't happen, no amount of revenue, whether it comes from higher fares, from a tax on millionaires as Mayor Bill de Blasio has proposed, or from congestion pricing as Mr. Cuomo has suggested, will be enough to fix the subways. Too many of those added dollars would be frittered away.
New Yorkers like to think their city is the best. But there is one superlative — most expensive subway line on Earth — no taxpayer or commuter would care to be associated with. The state's leaders ought to feel the same way.


Nick Hogan is an American reality television personality and actor who has an estimated net worth of $500 thousand. He was born Nicholas Allan Bollea on July 27, 1990 in Los Angeles County, California. He is best known as the son of semi-retired professional wrestler Hulk Hogan. He has appeared in his father's reality show, Hogan Knows Best, and its spin-off series Brooke Knows Best, a show which follows his sister, Brooke.
Nick is also involved in motorsports. He earned his Formula D competition license in 2006 from Formula Drift, the only professional drifting series in North America, competing on May 12, 2007 in Atlanta. Though his name drew the attention of sponsors, he had difficulty retaining their interest.
In 2008, Nick Hogan was involved in a severe single-car crash while he was out driving with the members of his pit crew. He was charged with multiple felonies, and has served eight months in prison, while his license was suspended for three years. In 2009, it was reported by the Wrestling Observer that he is currently training to become a pro wrestler like his father.


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As per Schedule II, the depreciation to be charged on the basis of the useful life of Asset, unlike the earlier Companies Act, where the rate of depreciation was prescribed instead of the useful life. This Schedule II prescribe the useful life of the Asset and further states that the useful life of an asset shall not ordinarily be different from the useful life specified in the schedule and the residual value of an asset shall not be more than 5% of the original cost (Gross Block) of the asset. Provided that where a company adopts a useful life different from what is specified in the schedule or uses a residual value different from the limit specified above, the financial statements shall disclose such difference and provide justification in this behalf duly supported by technical evidence. *In addition, Schedule II requires disclosure of justification only in case residual value exceeds 5% of the cost (Gross Block).


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Cursory examination days of the small corporation are over. A few years ago, new IRS offices were opening all over South Florida to expressly inspect small businesses, especially S-Corps. National budget cuts put the project on hold and offices closed.