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The coolest show on Earth
By Kit Chapman2016-07-26T00:00:00+01:00
Clouds of liquid nitrogen and flamethrowers are a usual sight at the offices of Russian science and art show Artnauka, Kit Chapman finds
© Artnauka
Artnauka's latest show involves using 100 litres of liquid nitrogen in eight minutes
'We weren't interested in working with children. When you work with children it's very easy to make them happy and fill them with wonder … you make a small experiment in a small tube and go "woo woo woo!" and children will be happy. This is easy. Making adults [feel] wonder is more difficult. You can only do that with huge explosions and huge fires.' Ekaterina Pakhomova is the manager of Artnauka, a Russian science show that takes chemistry to its on-stage extremes. In eight minutes, the team goes through 100 litres of liquid nitrogen as they dazzle crowds: drinking it and breathing it out in an icy cloud, freezing objects and smashing them in spectacular fights, firing white plumes into the air from metre-long tubes. It's a performance piece that's seen them travel the world since the group formed three years ago.
Artnauka, which translates as 'art science' puts on around 300 shows a year, Pakhomova explains, with demand usually peaking around December. 'We're eight people, and most of us have a technical background,' she says. 'My colleagues are chemists, physicists and mathematicians.'
This team, Pakhomova adds, is united by its goal to bring science to the masses. 'Science is not boring or just about different formulas. It's not just for university – it's more interesting and more beautiful … We would like to make people believe in it and love science from another side.'
Given the quantities of sub-zero substances Artnauka uses, it's unsurprising that their office in Moscow can attract attention. 'Every week we have a delivery of liquid nitrogen,' Pakhomova laughs. 'Our neighbours in our office block see huge vapour [clouds] going on to the street. Sometimes they're a little bit shocked. But for us, it's just a usual thing.'
Clouds of frozen nitrogen aren't the only reason the office gains attention. In July 2016 the Artnauka team made headlines with a series of photos depicting themselves as chemical elements or substances, enlisting the aid of a professional make-up artist and photographer. 'It was a crazy idea. One day we decided to have a party in our office and create something unusual and new. We decided to make superheroes out of chemical elements … we wanted to show that our main goal is to show that science and chemistry is really beautiful.'
Name: Ekaterina Pakhomova
Role: Manager, Artnauka
Based: Moscow, Russia
CV: Graduated Bauman Moscow State Technical University, Russia, before starting chemistry performance show Artnauka in 2013.
Science education is as much part of Artnauka's aim as entertainment. Before every show, the team spends hours with the guests, letting them get up close with chemistry in a controlled, safe environment. This, the team feels, enhances the show by making the audience curious about what's happening. 'We want people not to be afraid of the unknown,' says Pakhomova. 'Very often, they're afraid of putting liquid nitrogen on their hand. But if you do it the right way, nothing will happen … if you know science, if you know that nothing will happen, you can do a lot of interesting things.'
Expanding opportunities
This understanding also allows the team to focus on other opportunities for corporate clients. In addition to the shows, the team runs chemistry-based team building exercises and produces special effects videos for companies, allowing for some unique product demonstrations – such as standing behind a fire-resistant wall while a team member tried to set it alight with a flamethrower. Plans are currently afoot to expand in to China, and the group has already taken their show to Italy, Belarus, the United Arab Emirates and Kazakhstan.
This is part of an ongoing trend in science education in Russia, Pakhomova explains. 'Most people think that they should have a [science] education, and different science shows are very popular. Many people want their children to know about science, not just in the classroom but from shows.'
However, Pakhomova underlines that Artnauka is mainly for adults – that kids are simply too easy to entertain. And, once again, she emphasises their aim is to add a new dimension to the public's understanding of science. 'We're very happy that people can see chemistry and art is closer than you think.'
Kit ChapmanAuthor
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Oprah Running for President in 2020?
Oprah Winfrey gave a speech at the Golden Globes on the Me Too movement that could have doubled as a campaign rallying cry.
— January 8, 2018
The 75th annual Golden Globes ceremony was far different than any that had come before, mostly due to the fact that the sexual misconduct allegations that rocked Hollywood late last year are still hanging over the industry like a black cloud. The event led to impassioned speeches from actresses all night, but only one woman earned multiple standing ovations that brought the crowd to tears. Oprah Winfrey was honored as the first black woman to receive the Cecil B. DeMille award during Sunday's ceremony and though she was addressing a room full of her peers, she might as well have been announcing a 2020 presidential campaign to the world. The fiery speech immediately brought up rumors of the possibility of a President Winfrey.
During her acceptance speech, Oprah Winfrey recalled sitting on the floor in her childhood home watching Sidney Poitier become the first black person to win an Academy Award and later reminded herself that little girls were probably sitting at home watching her accept a prestigious award for the first time as well. But the main theme of the speech was the Me Too movement, telling everybody that a "new day is on the horizon," which elicited a standing ovation for the articulate and heartfelt words that touched on women in Hollywood all the way to the importance of the media. She had this to say.
RELATED: Kit Harington Responds to His Single Game of Thrones 2020 Golden Globes Nomination
"I want all the girls watching here, now, to know that a new day is on the horizon. And when that new day finally dawns, it will be because of a lot of magnificent women, many of whom are right here in this room tonight, and some pretty phenomenal men, fighting hard to make sure that they become the leaders who take us to the time when nobody ever has to say 'Me too' again."
Oprah Winfrey has publically declared that she was not thinking of running for president of the United States in 2020, but some people that are very close to the media mogul have stated otherwise since last night's speech. Winfrey's partner, Stedman Graham said, "It's up to the people. She would absolutely do it." Two of Oprah Winfrey's closest friends spoke to CNN anonymously to say that Winfrey is actively thinking about running, which was evidenced by her impassioned call for change at the Golden Globes.
Though her friends say that she is actively thinking about running for president, they also say that Oprah Winfrey has not yet made up her mind. Many liberal-leaning celebrities and viewers watching her speech at the Golden Globes certainly heard it that way. And that may have been exactly what Winfrey wanted. As some political strategists have pointed out in the past year, Oprah Winfrey's fame and wealth could make her a formidable Democratic Party candidate. However, it is also a question of whether America would vote for another TV star to run the country.
Everything is up in the air as of this moment, but Oprah Winfrey sure looked presidential during the 75th Golden Globes ceremony. In the past, Winfrey campaigned for Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton, noting that a female president would make for a "seminal moment for women." That obviously didn't happen, but maybe Oprah Winfrey can be that seminal moment for women in 2020. You can watch Oprah Winfrey's Golden Globes speech below and think about her running for President of the United States in 2020 courtesy of The Washington Post's YouTube channel.
Topics: Golden Globes
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Home » Common antifungal drug decreases tumor growth, shows promise as cancer therapy
Common antifungal drug decreases tumor growth, shows promise as cancer therapy
CenterWatch Staff
An inexpensive antifungal drug, thiabendazole, slows tumor growth and shows promise as a chemotherapy for cancer, according to scientists in the College of Natural Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin.
Hye Ji Cha, Edward Marcotte, John Wallingford and colleagues found that the drug—an FDA-approved, generic drug used for 40 years as an antifungal agent—destroys newly established blood vessels, making it a "vascular disrupting agent." Their research was published in the journal PLOS Biology.
In trials using mice, the researchers found that thiabendazole decreased blood vessel growth in fibrosarcoma tumors by more than a half. Fibrosarcomas are cancers of the connective tissue, and they are generally heavily vascularized with blood vessels. Inhibiting blood vessel, or vascular, growth can be an important chemotherapeutic tool because it starves tumors. Tumors induce new blood vessel formation to feed their out-of-control growth. The drug also slowed tumor growth.
"This is very exciting to us, because in a way we stumbled into discovering the first human-approved vascular disrupting agent," said Marcotte, professor of chemistry. "Our research suggests that thiabendazole could probably be used clinically in combination with other chemotherapies."
In a previous study, Cha, a graduate student in cell and molecular biology at the university, tested the drug in developing frog embryos, which are fast growing vertebrates in which scientists can watch blood vessel growth in living animals. Cha found that frog embryos grown in water with the drug either didn't grow blood vessels or grew blood vessels that were then dissolved away by the drug. Interestingly, when the drug was removed, the embryos' blood vessels grew back.
Cha then tested the drug on human blood vessel cells growing in Petri dishes, finding that the drug also inhibited their growth. Finally, she tested the drug on fibrosarcoma tumors in mice and found that it reduced blood vessel growth in the tumors as well as slowed the tumors' growth.
"We didn't set out to find a vascular disrupting agent, but that's where we ended up," said Wallingford, associate professor of developmental biology and Cha's graduate advisor with Marcotte. "This is an exciting example of the power of curiosity-driven research and the insights that can come from blending disciplines in biology."
The scientists' goal is now to move the drug into clinical trials with humans. They are talking with clinical oncologists about next steps.
"We hope the clinical trials will be easier because it is already approved by the FDA for human use," said Marcotte.


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Review: Honey Boy
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The League of Gentlemen: Welcome to Royston Vasey
Photo: norbert1 via Flickr
Written on 14th October 2019 . Posted in Film
As a through and through Derbyshire lad (note my semi-colloquial use of the word "lad"), there is no better starting point than the The League of Gentlemen. This conceptually unique late '90s BBC series combines the two rival genres of comedy and horror to, believe it or not, great effect.
Looked at in the terms of comic styles; it complements nuanced character studies with an overpowering element of caricature and the absurd. This may seem fairly old hat, given it can be seen throughout Monty Python and beyond, however it also fuses sitcom with sketch comedy which is far more unique.
The League's three television series, three live shows and feature film are all set in the fictional northern town of Royston Vasey. Nestled in and cut off by the bleak Derbyshire moorland. The show's main developing linear narrative concerns the insular town becoming invaded by those who are "not local".
Whether it be teenagers on walking holidays, the construction of a new road or the moving of the county borders, the citizens of the town battle to ensure that everything stays the same, almost to the point of backwards. "We don't like change. We don't even give change!," demonic shopkeepers Tubbs and Edward holler in series 1.
As a concept, I find their output very exciting. We all know of a 'strange' rural town, cut off by geography and seemingly suspicious of outsiders, filled with strange inhabitants and weird normalities. So far, so sitcom.
Photo: Herbaltablet via Wikimedia Commons
The conventions of sketch comedy are most apparent in the form of the show. Scenes are short, have a core joke and are just as unrelated as they are related. The other sketch convention is that all the characters are played by three of the show's writers – Mark Gatiss (familiar as the co-writer and aristocratic older brother in BBC's Sherlock), Steve Pemberton (familiar to early viewers of ITV's Benidorm) and Reece Shearsmith (familiar to anyone with any class).
The show has aged remarkably well. It has not diminished in comic merit unlike other cult series. Both Monty Python's Flying Circus and the Young Ones still have their moments, but are ultimately harder to watch than they once were.
Nor has the show fallen down the crevice along with the likes of Little Britain to be widely recognised as at best slightly distasteful or, at worst, downright offensive. The dark humour lands as well as it ever did. Underpinned by subtle parody of classic horror films which re-enforces that, no matter what dark twists the narrative takes, it is ultimately all in good humour and rarely (if ever) strays into the territory of bad taste.
This quirky, well observed and unique gem occupies a very special area of comedy. When it isn't laugh out loud funny, it is interesting. When a character is not going through a cartoonish set piece it sparkles with humanity. If it crosses the lines of convention and decency it is for a viable creative reason.
All three television series are currently available on BBC iPlayer; I thoroughly recommend them. If you are looking for work by four of the best comic writers around, look no further. Form, wordplay and sheer number of jokes per page are all top notch. Character performance and directing are also second to none.
So, go on! Give it a go! Make it completely impossible for you to request a bottle of orange juice, greet your friend David or watch a piece of 'issue based' theatre without allowing a wry smile to cross your lips.
Sam James
Tags: British Comedy, British television, comedy, The League of Gentlemen


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Pamela Fowler studied law at Cambridge University and embarked on a career in International Finance at Linklaters in London and Hong Kong. Pamela moved around the globe practising law in New Zealand and then finally settled in Cayman in 1998.
After starting a family with her husband, Jon Fowler, Pamela took the opportunity to stay at home and look after her three daughters, Hannah, Chloe and Meaghan.
Pamela is a member of First Baptist Church where she has enjoyed being a member of the choir for over a decade and is now leader of a bible study home group, which she loves.
In 2005, Pamela was instrumental in establishing the Cayman Islands Cystic Fibrosis Trust and spent five years in a fund raising role with this entity. More recently, she was Secretary General of the Cayman Islands Equestrian Federation and devoted many hours to the promotion and development of equestrian sports in Cayman.
Through volunteering as a Director with the YMCA in Cayman, Pamela is looking forward to helping to strengthen and develop the community through the many exciting programmes the Y is able to offer.


Long Term Care Insurance was created to help school board employees and their families cover their long term care costs when they can no longer look after themselves.
All of us probably know someone who had to go into a long term care facility -- a grandparent, a parent, an aunt, a friend. Maybe they had Alzheimer's or Dementia. Maybe they got into an accident. For whatever reason, they were no longer able to take care of themselves.
If they were close enough to us, you might even know how much it cost (anywhere from about $3,500 to $7,000+ / month for memory care). You might have experienced the long wait to get a spot, or the cost of paying for a private one. If you look around, you'll probably see a groundswell of of Baby Boomers who are going to be competing for those spaces -- at a much faster rate than facilities are being built. So if these spots are only going to get more expensive, how will you pay for it?
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Question: What is the likelihood I'll actually need this insurance?
Question: How much is Long Term Care going to cost me?
Right now there are about 490,000 Seniors living in Alberta. And about 10,500 Assisted Living units. By 2025 -- less than 10 years away, it's expected that there will be 763,000 Seniors living in Alberta -- a 64% increase. The average cost of an Assisted Living unit right now is about $2900 / month -- and that's for basic care, not memory care or other more expensive supports Assisted Living units are not being built at nearly the rate that the Seniors population is growing.
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Contact us today for more information on setting up your Long Term Care Insurance plan -- and take care of future costs before they happen.
The simple fact is that having a Critical Illness -- things like a Heart Attack, Stroke, Cancer, MS -- can be devastating on your health and finances. Learn how you can be prepared.
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Although the specific etiology of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) remains unknown, important insights into the genetics and environmental triggers underlying the disease have been made. This conference will discuss advances in MS genetics, epigenetics and the interaction of genetics with the environment, particularly with vitamin D metabolism and Epstein Barr Virus. There will be a focus on the immunopathogenesis of MS, including pre-active MS lesions, mechanisms of lymphocyte activation, the B cell and trafficking of cells across the blood brain barrier. The application of new imaging methods and therapeutic strategies that target the immune system and promote remyelination will be discussed. The challenge of integrating emerging insights in the basic mechanisms of myelination, autoimmune demyelination, and neurodegeneration with translational science will he discussed. The goal of this meeting is to provide a broad spectrum of MS researchers with a forum to discuss recent advances, and to foster cross-disciplinary interactions and collaborations.
Short Talk: Promoting Remyelination of MS Lesions: Where do Fish Fit in?


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Kentucky vs Florida NCAA Basketball Lines Preview
With probably the whole world watching to see if they'll be making history, the undefeated No. 1 Kentucky Wildcats will be playing arguably the biggest game of their life this Saturday against the Florida Gators. The Wildcats will be hoping to become the first team in over 30 years to go the entire NCAA basketball regular season without suffering any loss. Expectedly, the NCAAB odds will be super-busy as bettors seek not only to cash in from this highly-staked game, but also become a part of the millions of people that will be (hopefully) making with the Wildcats, or witnessing Kentucky's dreams crash ago-damn-nizingly close to the finish line. Want to be part of this auspicious betting occasion? Check out the preview below for a guide on how the two teams compare against each other, plus free picks in case you need to know which side presents you the best odds of being a winner in the game's NCAAB lines.
Gators vs. Kentucky NCAAB Odds Preview and Game Analysis
Venue: Rupp Arena, Lexington, Kentucky Date: Saturday, March 7, 2015 Time: 2:00 PM ET TV: CBS Spread: Kentucky -15 After losing seven of their last seven games between February 3rd and February 24th, the Gators seemingly figured their mistakes and fixed them, winning their last two straight games—a 66-49 victory over Tennessee on February 28th and the recent 66-62 win over Texas A&M this Tuesday (March 3rd). Saturday's game is therefore a great opportunity for the Gators (15-15, 8-9 in SEC) to make it to the National Invitational Tournament, while also stopping Kentucky from going unbeaten in the regular season, something no team has successfully done so far. Meanwhile, winning has been the consistent story for the Wildcats, who own a perfect 17-0 conference record in the SEC and a flawless 30-0 overall record for the entire season. Leading their shot at history-making this Saturday, as has been the case most season, will be Aaron Harrison (Kentucky's top scorer with 11.3 PPG), his twin brother Andrew Harrison (team-best 3.9 assists), and the ever-dazzling trio of Devin Booker (11.0 PPG), Karl-Anthony Towns (team-best 6.5 RPG) and Willie Cauley-Stein (6.4 RPG). Though the Wildcats' main strength has been their well-blended mean defense (No. 2 in the league allowing just 53.5 PPG) and solid attack (74.9 PPG scoring), their biggest asset is the ability of everyone in the team to seamlessly score and defend interchangeably. For instance, in Kentucky's 72-64 win over Georgia on Tuesday, it is the rebounding specialist Towns who came up big for the Wildcats, scoring a game-high 19 points 7 rebounds to save his team from blushes of an upset. Also, the likes of Tyler Ulis have been very important to the team, often putting up decent numbers off the bench. It will therefore be a daunting task for Florida to specifically pin-point Kentucky's go-to guy as all the players are very talented on both sides of the court. Even so, the Gators equally have talented players who are well-capable of holding their own. When the two teams met on February 7th, the Gators led the game by as many as nine points, but they could not finish off the Wildcats, which gave Kentucky a chance to come back into the game and sneak away with a 68-61 victory. On that day, Dorian Finney-Smith (Florida's second-best scorer with 13.1 PPG and a team-best 6.0 RPG) led his team with 16 points and five boards, while Kasey Hill, Eli Carter, and Michael Frazier II also scored in double figures, racking up 12, 11, and 10 points respectively. Frazier II, who is Florida's leading scorer with 13.2 PPG, should thus be able to rally up his teammates for another solid game, even if they'll be playing on the road. The secret to doing keeping Kentucky contained, and within striking distance, will be to play in the same way they've done in their last two games—tightening up their defense and keeping the opponent pressured to force turnovers, and then using the ball from such opportunities to look for offensive scores. After Kentucky coughed up eight steals in their first meeting and missing most of its threes in February due to Florida's meanness in defense, implementing a similar strategy is highly likely to work to their favor, and give them a chance to upset their hosts.
Florida vs Kentucky Key Betting Trends
• Florida is 5-2 ATS in its last seven games against Kentucky • Kentucky is 4-4 ATS in its last eight SEC games at home • Kentucky is 6-4 SU and 5-5 ATS in its last 10 games against Florida • Florida is 0-4 SU and 1-3 ATS in its last four road games • Kentucky is 5-0 SU and 3-2 ATS in its last five home games • The total has gone UNDER in three of the last five games between Florida and Kentucky • The total has gone OVER in three of the last five Florida games • The total has gone OVER in four of the last five Kentucky games
My Prediction and Pick
Kentucky rolls to a win plus cover in spite of Florida's persistent pressure. A shootout looks to be in the books, particularly early in the game, so a high scoring affair could be in the offing for an OVER game total.


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High durability, ideal for long-hours of video recordings and playbacks.
Ideal for automotive recorders and surveillance systems, including home security cameras, IP cameras, etc.
Endurance rated for up to with Full HD 1080P video recording: 16Gb: 3,000hrs; 32Gb: 6,000 hours; 64Gb: 12,000 hours.
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Hello all. I am fortunate (or foolhardy) enough to get to grow hops in my backyard this year. It is my first time growing them, and I was wondering if anyone on the forums is from Northeast Kansas, and has tried growing them in this climate before. I am reading everything I can get my hands on right now (including the other posts in this category) to ensure a healthy start, and have already pre-ordered the rhizomes.
For the record, I am going to be growing Fuggle, Hallertauer, Willamette, Magnum, and Kent Golding. I'll certainly post pics when the bines start to fill out.


text:
Guy Who Tried to Shut Down Kid's Lemonade Stand Gets a Taste of His Own Medicine. And That Totally Sucks.
Katherine Mangu-Ward | 9.2.2014 12:50 PM
Tampa Bay Times video screenshot
Remember Doug Wilkey, the grumpy Floridian who tried to get a lemonade stand that was operating next door to his house shut down by local authorites? Whelp, looks like he's getting a taste of his own medicine.
A tipster contacted the city and pointed officials toward records that show Wilkey, as recently as March, listed his Patricia Avenue home as the principal business address for Bayport Financial Services.
Planning director Greg Rice said officials were drafting a letter notifying Wilkey, 61, that all companies operating in the city require a business tax license, which costs about $45 a year, and that home-based-business owners must sign an affidavit agreeing to follow special rules.
It's tempting to say "Karma's a bitch, sucka!" and leave it at that.
But that's the wrong response.
Yes, Wilkey, 61, started it by trying to bring in the government where simple human-to-human interaction should have sufficed. But is is just as troubling that the local government has now decided to use its powers to harass this man, simply because he's kind of a jerk with unpopular opinions.
Crotchety old men aren't as photogenic as entrepreneurial kids, but they deserve the same rights and protections. All the reasons why Guerrero deserves to be left alone to make an honest buck apply equally to Wilkey. In fact, running a financial services company out of your home likely has even fewer negative externalities than setting up a lemonade stand.
It seems pretty clear the city is looking into this guy's business because he managed to draw attention to himself in a negative way. And of course the hypocrisy here is as delicious as a glass of Country Time on a hot day.
But I guarantee you that there are other home-based businesses on that block. In a time and place where nearly every human action is smothered in laws, rules, and regulations, enforcement will necessarily be arbitrary. Limited resources mean that cops and licensing bureaus get to choose who they go after, and those choices will usually be made for reasons that have little to do with efficiency or justice.
When I wrote about the lemonade stand, I gave the local Dunedin authorities "three cheers." I take them back. When a grumpy tipster complained about a commercial activity by a cute kid who wasn't hurting anyone, they looked into the matter and wisely chose inaction. Then the same situation presented itself with a less appealing protagonist, and they did the opposite. Zero cheers.
NEXT: "The Hunger Games, The Giver and Divergent all depict rebellions against the state, and promote a tacit right-wing libertarianism"
Katherine Mangu-Ward is editor in chief of Reason.
Entrepreneurship Regulation Food Freedom
Show Comments (102)
September.2.2014 at 12:55 pm
Is there an Iron Lore somewhere that sez "me today, you tomorrow"?
So looks like it's Wilkey today.
I'm guessing there won't be any sudden reform on business licensing in this town soon.
Yes, Wilkey, 61, started it by trying to bring in the government where simple human-to-human interaction should have sufficed. But is is just as troubling that the local government has now decided to use its powers to harass this man, simply because he's kind of a jerk with unpopular opinions.
You don't bring in a wild beast (the government) to maul your neighbors, then cry when its hunger is unsatisfied and it turns on you.
Ideally, Mr. Wilkey will learn that government is rarely the solution. Reality says he won't.
My guess is Mr. Wilkey won't even make the connection.
Francisco d'Anconia
September.2.2014 at 1:12 pm
My guess is Mr Wilkey is not mentally capable of making the connection.
Cap'n Krunch
The bigger problem is that none of his neighbors will see the connection either, they'll just enjoy the schadenfreude with their morning coffee.
JohnD
The only thing as bad as this creep Wilkey, is the fool Mangu-Ward that is trying to defend him. She is a moron.
enforcement will necessarily be arbitrary
Which, by the way is the point.
Easily predictable and clearly defined laws and enforcement don't keep the populace hiding in the reeds in fear.
It's fear that runs this country and without it, the government's power is too easy to question.
To able to go after anyone, at any time by dropping the regulatory phonebook on its spine and have it open to a random page with an applicable regulation… that's power.
Dances-with-Trolls
The lesson: Never, ever, ever, ever draw the state's attention to yourself.
sarcasmic
Invisible Finger
Centuries ago, the phrase was "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone."
Not sure I agree with that. Is it better to fight tyranny or hide from it?
Define better.
I'm a "hider", but thankful for the fighters like Snowden.
Freedom won't happen unless enough of us stand up and demand it.
Hence the commonly misunderstood saying, freedom isn't free.
The only contribution I make is to try to spread the word. I avoid any contact with the gov't for the sake of my sanity, not so much for safety reasons.
But again, I admire the ones on the front lines.
September.3.2014 at 2:32 am
" freedom isn't free."
Of course not. Everybody knows it costs a buck-oh-five.
There are things that gnaw on a man worse than dying.
Many of them are films with Kevin Costner in them.
I like Costner.
But +1 on the retort, though.
gaoxiaen
That's why I quit taking bath salts.
Water world we live in that includes long, boring Kevin Costner films.
September.3.2014 at 12:40 am
Chumby, I think you meant 'What a'. Auto correct must have screwed up The Post, man.
It was a pun, dummy.
I'm a fighter by nature, but no fool, either, and I'd rather not get squashed in a meaningless conflict. David didn't beat Goliath by fighting Goliath's fight.
Safety in numbers. If a third of the population stands as one, there will not be retribution. We saw this in the 60s. You get enough people protesting, it swamps the resources available to exact retribution against individuals.
perlhaqr
That's not "David's fight" though. That's more like Goliath vs: Goliath.
And, uh, I dunno if you've looked at the percentages that Libertarian candidates get lately, but "a third of the population" it ain't.
Not yet, but it's coming.
Anon E. Mouse
Not if you keep advocating for open borders, legal heroin, and anarchy.
Amen. The Libertarian's just don't get it. They will never be a political powerhouse because they are so far out in … Well, I started to say left field, but that's not right. Let's just say the are out of touch.
jeyon
so are the predictions of the global warming alarmists /sarc
Intn'l House of Badass
No, the lesson is that when you see someone planting the seeds of a state, you should kill it before it grows.
And shoot the sheriff.
Najwalaylah
But do not shoot the deputy.
MegaloMonocle
(a) Yes, it sucks that these laws are on the books.
(b) Given (a), I shed no tears when these laws are turned on people like Wilkey.
JMatt
AlmightyJB
It sounds like it was the tipster that targeted him not the gubment.
And yeah. Fuck him.
The government was just the weapon. Which should really be against the Geneva Convention.
But I guarantee you the there are other home-based businesses on that block.
That sentence just made Tony break out in hives. What sort of hellscape is this, where people conduct economic transactions outside the gaze of Top Men?
I heard there was a lemonade stand running regularly just down the street.
Notorious G.K.C.
Most victims of govt oppression fall short of Libertarian Purism – so it's a Good Thing that KMW isn't making the tempting cheap shots and keeping her principles.
I mean, you can find some guy who got beaten by cops and say, "aha! he voted Democrat, let's see how he likes statism *now!*" or you can champion the cause of the victims, bearing in mind that painting the victim as unsympathetic is a favorite tactic of those who justify oppression.
I mean, you can find some guy who got beaten by cops and say, "aha! he voted Democrat, let's see how he likes statism *now!*"
Hold on there baby doll.
I think this is much, much closer to calling the cops to turn in the people hiding Anne Frank in the attic of the house next door, and then getting hauled in yourself for being a homosexual.
The tipster looked at this guy's action and decided to treat it as a maxim. Since that's perfectly fair, Wilkey has no grounds for complaint.
Is there a line? I guess so, since your example seems to be on one side of it. But Wilkey's case is on the other side of that line, AFAIAC.
The tipster looked at this guy's action and decided to treat it as a maxim.
People forget that the Golden Rule has a flipside, namely, that, by ratting out a neighbor, you have done unto others, and so you must wish that they do the same unto you.
Really, the only difference between "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" and "An eye for an eye" is timing.
I refer to giving people what they have go me to others as the Silver Rule.
go me = done
Thanks autocorrect.
I don't agree with the Godwinning here – this was a dispute over a kid's business on private property, not whether to send a kid to an extermination camp.
But let's pursue the Godwin argument – looking at history, we find that many of the people murdered by totalitarian governments were themselves statists or even totalitarians. Eg, Trotsky and Ernst Rohm. Their murders were still crimes worthy of denunciation, and emblematic of the wickedness of the regimes which murdered them, even if Trotsky supported Commie dictatorship and Romh was a thug and terrorist.
I dunno, Notorious. I just have a hard time shedding tears over people who are enthusiastic supporters of a regime but are subsequently victimized.
I guess I just think anyone who falls afoul of an Iron Law should have seen it coming and essentially "assumed the risk".
Me today, you tomorrow.
Unless they actually realize their error and change.
When the ax is cleaving your skull it's a little late for that.
(see below)
Marshall Gill
All the reasons why Guerrero deserves to be left alone to make an honest buck apply equally to Wilkey
All but one, Wilkey's willingness to use the government against his neighbor. At some point, it is Just for one who "lives by the sword" to "die by the sword".
Faceless Commenter
No, this doesn't suck. The city didn't "go after" the guy; the story clearly says it was "a tipster," same as Wilkey was when he turned in the lemonade saleskid.
This is fair turnabout. If you want a more transcendent solution, the lemonade kid's mom and Mr. Wilkey could work together to stop such government interference.
Fist of Etiquette
When I wrote about the lemonade stand, I gave the local Dunedin authorities "three cheers." I take them back.
All of them?
UnCivilServant
Minus depreciation.
Xeones
So, like 2.7 cheers, then.
Less. A cheer loses 15% of its value as soon as you drive it off the lot.
Fair is fair. If you want to have rules, you have to live by them. But the fact that this guy doesn't think the rules should apply to him, doesn't say anything good or bad about the rules.
Scarecrow Repair
I agree with the principle that if oppressing the kid was wrong, so was oppressing the old fart.
But my overall take is different. Coercive government is the given and very unlikely to change. Thus what does count is the grump being hoisted by his own petard.
The theoretical chance of getting rid of the oppressive state is fantasy. Educating a few people to not trust the state is a real opportunity, and the fact that the grump brought the attention on himself just makes it more fun.
OK, let's see what happens with imposing a niceness test on victims of civil-liberties violations:
Miranda (of Miranda Warnings fame) almost certainly kidnapped a young girl and drove her into the desert and raped her, putting her in fear of her life.
The victims of Stalin's Purge Trials were generally hard-core Commies.
The suspects tortured by U.S. forces (or foreign governments to whom the task was subcontracted) were frequently no-kidding terrorists.
"It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have frequently been forged in controversies involving not very nice people." Felix Frankfurter, dissenting in United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 69 (1950).
Your examples are not very consistent, or I am very dense.
Miranda, a scumbag, was helped by a court ruling, which also helped countless others in holding off an oppressive government. This might have been a useful analogy if the state had realized the error of its ways and dropped its oppressive laws concerning grumpy, but they didn't.
Stalin's victims, scumbags as bad as Stalin himself, were not helped by anything, and would not have been helped by anything, since they were as bad as Stalin.
The US torture victims were yet another class of scumbags who were victimized by other scumbags.
See, that's not what I wrote about. I made the very small point that theory is nice, but theory isn't going to change the oppressive state, and having this grump oppressed by his own petard might actually educate a few people about oppressive states.
If Trotsky's death by his former colleagues educated a few people about the nature of communism, that's a better result than Trotsky surviving and continuingto fool people about the true nature of collectivist dictators.
You go ahead and argue theory all you want, and change nothing.
OK, based on some of the discussion above, let us stipulate for the sake of argument that people who invoke oppressive laws against their neighbors deserve, in a cosmic sense, to have oppressive laws invoked against them in turn.
But poetic justice is not actual justice.
Does the *public* deserve having oppressive laws enforced at all, even against bad people? No, the public doesn't deserve it.
And stipulating that the rigid enforcement of oppressive laws will turn people against these laws, that *still* isn't a justification for enforcing bad laws, because it's wrong "to do evil that good may come of it."
Everyone who wants to enforce oppressive laws claims that this will bring about good results!
"Miranda, a scumbag, was helped by a court ruling, which also helped countless others in holding off an oppressive government."
And there in a nutshell is much of the history of liberty.
Sometimes you get someone out of Central Casting – a virtuous defender of righteousness who is unjustly persecuted – the lives of the Saints can be mentioned here.
But just as often, it's some bad actor like Miranda.
But the precedent set in the case of the scumbags affects the virtuous and near-virtuous as well.
Oh, and I would add that being a scumbag doesn't mean one forfeits one's human dignity and rights.
Why are you sticking up for the cops?
Hmmm. It's hard to have much dignity when you're a scumbag.
I'll try to make it even simpler.
Trying to change government to not be government is a waste of time.
Laughing at a jerk who got stomped by the government he was trying to use to stomp somebody else is great fun, and might even educate a few people.
Trotsky dying at the hands of Stalin didn't change Stalin or Communism, but it might have enlightened a few people.
Getting all upset about the theory is pointless. Laughing at fools whose dogma got run over by their karma has nothing to do with my own theoretical purity, how I would behave, or how you would behave.
JWM
Just a note-a few years after Miranda was freed because of the Court's ruling, he got into a fight in a bar, was stabbed and died.
I'm no libertarian Jesus. I'm frail, human, and prone to imperfection….
So while it sucks for the old man, karma' same bitch!
Wtf…. Kama's a bitch….
Marty Feldman's Eyes
I don't know what it is with cities and "business tax". I got hit with one- because the second house on my property is rented out I have to pay a business tax of of 50 bucks, because of my rental "business". I'm not sure what that money is supposed to be for. If I don't rent it out, it's not like there is $50 less demand for city services, and the increased value of the property as a rental is already figured into the purchase price, which means my property taxes already take into account the rental unit. They do these ticky-tack fees because they can, they make them big enough to get some cash out of you but they make it a small enough amount that most people won't complain.
"They do these ticky-tack fees because they can, they make them big enough to get some cash out of you but they make it a small enough amount that most people won't complain."
Yes they do – its the idea of "Death (or, theft) by a thousand papercuts".
HolgerDanske
Good thing you paid up and don't live in Philly, or your property might have been suspected of some sort of criminal guilt, then taken from you.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/in…..n-lawsuit/
Next up, lemonade kid also forced to acquire "business tax license". Oh, and you have been remitting sales tax on those lemonade sales, right…
The cops gave the kid a pass, the bureaucrats, not so much.
The cops gave the kid a pass
So you are saying that they killed his dog and shot him, non-fatally, in the leg?
Baelzar
Live by the sword, die by the sword.
What's good for the goose is good for the gander.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
The Tone Police
I fail to see why children should be expected to be fully compliant with the regulatory State.
It's edumacational.
Sometimes they do.
As in "justifiable" homicide when you shoot someone in self-defense.
Which, BTW, is another good example of the flipside of the Golden Rule: if you start it, you don't get to complain when the tables are turned.
Please list the 2 "wrongs" in this case.
If that thy roof be made of glass,
It shows small wit to pick up stones
To pelt the people as they pass.
AndyPandy
Country Time is disgusting.
Chocolatejeebus
Anyone who's had ACTUAL lemonade knows this.
Bob10011001
The kid wasn't trying to run a legitimate business. He was operating a lemonade stand. ANd you had no problem with it before. SO you problem is actually witht eh city ordinances that req
So you were previously OK with the child not having city ordinances forced on him (as he shouldn't; he was having a day of fun, not attempting to operate a business at a profit) but for some reason you now take that back because this 61 year old man operating a for-profit business is being forced to follow the law? You feel no one should have to follow the city ordinances then, is that your issue?
His actions were brought to the city's attention and they dealt with it. Anyone else operating a business illegally would also face the consequences should it be brought to the cities attention. I encourage you to inform the city if you know of any others.
Bill Dalasio
While I see Ward's point on a one-off basis, I'm not sure I can agree given that this entire matter happened on a multi-iteration process. That this happened to Wilkey is wrong. But, it happened given his behavior towards Guerrero. In that case, I'd say there's a certain justice in the entire matter. Ideally, there should be some downside in sicking the state on someone. Otherwise, what incentive is there to not do so? You have as case of getting your way if statists are sympathetic and no loss if they aren't. Across the board, let these sorts of folks have to eat their own cooking. Maybe, just maybe, they'll loose the appetite for it.
Why is it wrong that it happened to Wilkey? he is a tax dodger and a weasel. Are you suggesting he is above the law?
Doug Wilkey is a stinking hypocrite and got what he deserved.
UCrawford
While the law itself is ridiculous, here are two arguments for why it's fine by me that Wilkey got nailed.
A) He started the entire debacle by bringing the government down on a little kid out of apparently little more than spite. Turnabout is fair play.
B) His neighbors get to see what happens when you snitch to the government over inconsequential things. Cautionary tales that make examples of capricious assholes are a good thing.
TashaCurtissdbi
Start working at home with Google! It's by-far the best job I've had. Last Wednesday I got a brand new BMW since getting a check for $6474 this – 4 weeks past. I began this 8-months ago and immediately was bringing home at least $77 per hour. I work through this link, go? to tech tab for work detail
———————- http://www.jobs700.com
But will I need a business tax license from the government?
Ignoring laws isn't the answer. Yes, they should enforce the regulations on the book strictly. Hopefully, that will piss enough people off to change the laws.
See Double You
It was one of you guys, wasn't it?
Dealing with the government usually guarantees a Libertarian convert. Maybe only for a little while, but every bit helps. Maybe the heart and mind of Mr. Wilkey will be won over now that he knows how it feels, or at the very least question getting the government involved in the future. What can I say, I'm an optimist.
GregMax
Hello! 61 is not an "old man".
i felt old at 61 – altho it was difficult to admit
i give them 3 cheers – it's the law – the old guy tried to get it enforced against a youngster – which brought his own illegal activity to the fore
sure – there are other similar law breakers – but as the cop writing a ticket to the one speeder among many he pulled over – who protests "why me" – the reply is "do you catch all the fish when you're fishing?" – in this reality – you catch the bad guys when you folow the evidence – or at random – or when they shoot up flares
i don't believe in kharma – but if someone is going to break the law – however i feel about that law – he better not use that law against someone else
ozzybroad
my neighbor's step-aunt makes $74 /hour on the internet . She has been out of a job for seven months but last month her check was $12917 just working on the internet for a few hours.
find more information========== http://www.jobsfish.com
tryanmax
It doesn't get hot enough in Death Valley to make Country Time taste good.


text:
How-To Dec 18, 2020 11 min read
Protect Margins With Security Tools in Ecommerce
by Paul Gray
Fraudsters are a challenge in commerce, and brands must continually adapt to defend against malicious and fraudulent activity. A recent report highlighted that fraudulent attempts are up 55% since the COVID-19 pandemic began, with retailers spending as much as 10% of their annual budget on fraud prevention. Stopping bots and fraudsters is important, as there's a risk of upsetting legitimate shoppers.
33% of U.S. consumers say they would never shop again with online stores that reject their legitimate purchase attempt. - Sapio Research
As stores grow, additional team members and external partners are added to help manage increasingly complex operations. But this can introduce risk of over-writing work, making accidental changes or keeping access open after a team member has left.
By implementing tools and processes to reduce fraudulent orders, cancellations, and rework, brands can improve the buying experience for their most loyal fans. This post explores how brands can protect margins with trust and security apps.
Protect store access with SAML, SCIM, and two-factor authentication
Bot mitigation
Free up support and finance teams from investigations
Reduce false positives in risk management
Turn back time with complete store backups
Ecommerce security apps
Typically, the larger the ecommerce company, the more people have access to the site. A Verizon Data Breach and Investigations Report (DBIR) reported that 69% of security breaches were caused by outsiders and 86% of those breaches were financially motivated, leading to stolen credit card information.
The "Least Privilege" principle works by providing store access only to those who need it to perform their job. Conducting audits on who has access, including unused third-party apps may increase the security and stability of the store.
The Verizon report confirms that password reuse is a widespread problem as stolen and reused credentials are implicated in 80% of hacking-related breaches.
"You wouldn't leave the door of your home unlocked overnight," says Colin Bodell, VP of Engineering at Shopify Plus. And as a business scales with more stores and staff over time, forgoing these security measures is equivalent to leaving multiple brick-and-mortar stores around the world unlocked at once.
To protect store access on Shopify Plus, the most secure action a brand can take is to turn on SAML and SCIM to authenticate users and manage, add/remove new ones.
If there isn't an existing integration with a third-party identity provider, the next best thing is to enable an organization-level two-factor authentication (TFA) to ensure that only authorized staff can log in to the backend.
Shopify also supports direct integrations with industry-leading identity providers such as Okta, Azure, and OneLogin, allowing organizations to securely manage the authentication, creation, and removal of users securely through platforms they already use.
Product drops build significant anticipation among the brand's fan community, and it's a critical event that brings in surges in traffic and sales. During popular product releases, such as Jeffree Star's Cremated Collection, or exclusive product releases, like with Union x Jordan, bad actors may be creating and deploying bots to purchase items, only to resell them for many times the original value.
Not only can this mean that items aren't available for the brand's legitimate fans, but it also clogs up the website and can lead to problems in resolving fraudulent or broken orders. When fans can't purchase, they can air frustrations on social media, or put strains on customer support teams.
Shopify's bot protection is an out-of-the-box solution for Shopify Plus brands that protects stores from bad actors. It levels the playing field to make sure that all customers have the same opportunity to purchase.
It combines industry-standard protection—e.g., blocking known bots from completing a checkout—with Shopify's exclusive Checkpoint solution. With Checkpoint enabled, all buyers must complete a unique challenge and qualify as a human before they can enter the checkout.
Protection can be turned on for 60 minutes at the store level with the flip of a switch, or can be scheduled in advance for peak periods, such as new product drops or BFCM and holiday sales. Once the time period is over, the coverage is turned off.
In late August, Union Los Angeles released a new collaboration with Jordan Brand Online. The unique product generated a lot of buzz and the team worked with Shopify Plus to ensure the shopping experience would be as fair as possible. They added a simple but fun question (In this case: What color is an orange?) that shoppers had to answer to get to the product. This, combined with other protections running in the background helped keep the store operating smoothly as it successfully coped with massive volumes—over 800,000 visitors were on the store during this peak period.
"Our launch went off without a hitch and the Shopify team was instrumental in making sure that real live people were able to purchase manually," says Chris Gibbs of Union Los Angeles.
Shopify Plus helps brands manage campaigns and flash sales
Brands experiencing rapid growth no doubt enjoy seeing increased order volumes, however this often brings with it the need to review orders for fraud. Even a very small percentage of risky orders can add up to a large number, and often brands assign customer support or finance teams the task of manually reviewing orders. This is time-consuming and tedious work, and distracts teams from tasks that can add more value for customers.
While the amount of time manual order review requires varies widely by brand and depends on the fraud system a brand has in place, retailers have reported spending as much as 120 hours a week reviewing orders.
CurrentBody is spearheading one of the fastest growing trends in the world of beauty: electrical beauty devices for at-home use. Their impressive growth over the past few years accelerated dramatically in 2020, particularly in international markets. It added more regional online stores as it expanded globally, finding new customers but also facing challenges. The nuances of each market made identifying fraud more difficult. Furthermore, the brand wanted to fight back against unauthorized resellers, who would attempt to make bulk purchases to sell at profit.
"International orders often look suspicious when really they are legitimate orders. Shoppers may use WeChat IDs and often don't have email addresses. They buy multiple electronic beauty devices at the same time, says Lyn Carbine, Head of Trading at CurrentBody. "We knew that typically more than 70% of declined orders were actually legitimate and we couldn't let those slip through the cracks. That burden was taxing."
With a decline rate of 7%, and the customer support team spending 10–20 hours per week manually reviewing declined orders, CurrentBody implemented Signifyd to automate and improve the accuracy of the review process. Signifyd's Commerce Protection Platform uses machine learning and big data to sift fraudulent orders from legitimate ones. It also provides the tools to identify unauthorized resellers and abusive behavior including promotion abuse and false claims that an ordered package never arrived. Signifyd backs its decisions with a financial guarantee.
Signiyfd's Agent Console module allows users to review cases with machine learning and Signiyfd's Decision Center module allows users to configure business policies to compliment machine learning and simulate outcomes.
While sophisticated machine learning and automation can go a long way toward managing risk, there is always a role for human expertise. Illegitimate chargebacks, based on claims that a package never arrived or that a product was not as promised often result from a poor customer experience. Brands can minimize those claims by designing beautiful and informative websites.
Clear product descriptions, detailed product photos, sizing guides, explainer videos, and customer reviews reduce the likelihood that a consumer will be disappointed with the product they receive. Clear and prominently displayed return policy will make it less likely that a customer will find it so difficult to return a product that they'll file a chargeback to get a refund instead. According to Signifyd's January Consumer Sentiment Survey:
28.9% of consumers said they filed a false chargeback either because they couldn't figure out how to return a product or because returning it would be too much trouble.
The same survey underscored the importance of clear communication in avoiding illegitimate chargebacks. Of the respondents who had filed a false claim, 29.4% said they filed the claim because the product they ordered arrived, but later than promised. Retailers would be wise to immediately contact a customer at the first sign an order might be delayed. Frequent updates are reassuring. And brands might consider offering a gift card or making some other thoughtful gesture if fulfillment promises are broken.
After implementation, CurrentBody's order approval rate surged to over 98% and their chargeback rate fell from 0.5% to just 0.04%. Signifyd's solution also significantly cut the time the customer support team spent reviewing orders.
"After establishing clear policies within Signifyd, our unauthorized reseller rate effectively dropped to zero," says Carbine.
"The impact of this on our brand and partnerships can't be overstated. We've regained control of millions of dollars worth of product that would have flowed through the wrong channels."
It's often challenging to find the right balance between convenience and security, and in some instances, legitimate shoppers may be flagged at a risk level that impacts their purchase. Certain industries are more susceptible to being flagged for higher risk, with footwear, apparel, sporting goods, smoke and vape, and nutritional supplements likely to experience an incorrect decision over 20% of the time.
A false positive that leads to a legitimate transaction being declined affects more than just that one order. It can be disappointing for the customer and may lead to increased volume to the merchant's customer support team. A survey of 3,200 U.S. consumers revealed that 33% of respondents would not shop with a merchant again if their purchase was declined.
Established in 2002, Urban Industry is a British streetwear retailer that sells high-quality footwear, clothing, and accessories from more than 90 brands. As a brand working in an industry that sees higher than average fraud, the company was relying on internal teams to screen for fraud, using a combination of clunky payment gateway filters, lots of online research (e.g. social media profiles and public housing records) coupled with intuition (i.e. feeling out the fraudsters). Facing increasing volumes, the brand implemented an automated fraud solution which reduced fraudulent orders, however they began to experience an increase in customer complaints about cancelled orders. This led the team to begin double-checking transactions that the automated solution had flagged, ironically doing as much, if not more work than before.
Urban Industry turned to NoFraud, hoping for a better experience, specifically around order approval rates. They decided to run both solutions in tandem so they have a real apples-to-apples comparison. Using their AI powered fraud analysis, NoFraud's proactive review process helped increase the order acceptance rate and virtually eliminating the customer service inquiries related to false declines.
After implementation, the impact was significant. During the testing period, NoFraud was able to increase the order approval rate a whopping 6.9%, from 84.3% to 91.2%. On orders with an incorrect billing address, the approval rate jumped from 46% to 95%.
Preventing fraud should not prevent brands from realizing revenue.
iDrinkCoffee was founded to bring fresh high-quality coffee to everyone. Over ten years, the company has curated a collection of the finest coffee equipment, espresso machines and accessories, as well as roasting its own coffee. By selling premium-priced products, the brand has experienced sophisticated fraud attempts.
"In one case, I was away, and we had an attempt valued at over $65,000. And the card network cleared it. But my staff got nervous and decided to call me. I did some investigating and realized it was fraudulent. I spoke to the card network, and they had flagged it, but would have only started investigating several days later—long after the merchandise would have been in the fraudster's hands and gone forever." Slawek Janicki, Chief Caffeine Director
iDrinkCoffee turned to Clearsale, implementing the app on their store for its worldwide sales. This introduced new automated procedures for all website orders. Clearsale immediately reviews information in the order and validates this against device information, external data sources, behavioural and historical data to score the order. Where it falls beneath a predetermined threshold, the order is approved.
If the order falls outside the threshold, the order is sent to a Clearsale fraud analyst, who conducts initial reviews to determine if the order is fraudulent. The team is motivated to approve orders, not decline them, and if a first analyst determines fraud, it is passed to a second analyst to confirm. This happens in as little as a few minutes, with the team operating 24/7/365. This human-in-the-loop reduces false positives, but also helps to prevent highly sophisticated attacks.
iDrinkCoffee saw a rapid improvement, with an 8.6% increase in approval rates and a 75% reduction in fraud attempts. This provided legitimate shoppers with a better experience, but also lowered the impact from fraudsters, leading to a 27% increase in month-over-month sales within one quarter.
Clearsale also helps brands better prepare, to reduce the likelihood of false positives, sharing information between teams and understanding how changes in the language used on the store and in checkout can help shoppers reduce their risk of being flagged. By giving teams more confidence, brands are better equipped to market to new audiences and secure orders that might be perceived as risky, but with the right tools, can be a new revenue stream.
Brands are having to adapt and move faster than ever. It's especially true during peak periods such as BFCM and holiday sales. Multiple team members are working at breakneck speed to meet challenging deadlines. This pace is critical to successfully fulfill orders, but the risk of innocent mistakes rises.
So many different people touch a store; it's very easy to unintentionally delete a product collection or remove a block of code that breaks a store theme or causes further damage. During BFCM and peak period preparations, making updates via CSV uploads is very common, however, this method can cause issues with pages, posts, menus, and other aspects of the store.
A recent survey indicated that 1 in 4 stores have lost vital data from images, product descriptions, themes, customers orders, and more. Disruptions like these can cost thousands of dollars in missed sales opportunities and hours of manual labor to recover from.
Crossrope re-invented the jump rope workout to give everyday heroes the freedom to pursue their fitness goals on their own terms. With weighted ropes, interchangeable handles, and the highest quality materials, the brand has built an avid community. Crossrope's digital marketing team learned the value of having a backup strategy the hard way after some routine changes rendered their store inaccessible.
Wanting to give their store a quick makeover, the Crossrope team added a snippet of code to their theme. After running some tests to ensure everything worked, the changes were shipped, and the team went home for the day. The next morning, they quickly realized something was wrong.
Throughout the night, customers were unable to add products to their carts. This halted all sales and led to a mad rush trying to fix the issues. To make matters worse, the Crossrope team realized their most recent theme hadn't been saved. Their only option was to revert back to an earlier theme that was over a month old. While that backup got the store back to working order after nearly 24 hours of downtime, it undid over a month's worth of successful work.
Crossrope turned to Shopify Plus Certified App Partner Rewind to automatically back up their data and swiftly recover from mistakes caused by human error, third-party app integrations, bad CSV files, malicious attacks, and disgruntled employees. Rewind offers automatic, continuous backups, nightly backups, and on-demand backups as needed. If there's ever an instance where Crossrope needs to correct a mistake their team can easily rewind individual items (e.g. a product), multiple items (e.g. collections), or the entire store.
Beyond having a backup strategy, one best practice is to limit store access (as stated above.)
Brands are using innovative techniques to reduce the impact of fraudsters, while ensuring shoppers have a seamless and hassle-free buying experience. Thousands of Shopify Plus brands use our bot protection features as well as Trust and Security Apps to protect margins and secure customer experience.
Clearsale
NoFraud
Signifyd
Paul Gray
Paul is a Partner Marketing Lead at Shopify Plus, where he works with an ecosystem of 200+ agency and technology partners, that help high-volume and Fortune 500 merchants launch, grow, and scale their businesses. He's also published several Speculative Fiction stories in Nature Magazine, Andromeda Spaceways, PodCastle, and others. He published the interactive fiction story 'Shadowcast', played by over 300,000 people. He's also working on his first novel.
Check out Paul Gray's work


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text:
Q: What is the operator for the edge current of a fracional quantum Hall state? The edge of a fractional quantum Hall state is a chiral conformal field theory. In the Laughlin case it corresponds to the chiral boson,
$$ S = \frac{1}{4\pi} \int dt dx \left[\partial_t\phi\partial_x\phi - v (\partial_x\phi)^2\right]$$
Here the field $\phi$ is identified with the charge density operator:
$$ \rho(x) = \frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi} \partial_x\phi$$
Now, you expect this operator to be the zero'th component of a two-vector, $J^\mu = (\rho, j)$ with $j$ the edge current. So how does $j$ relate to $\phi$ ? The reason I'm asking is that the literature gives different answers for this.

*

*This paper states at the beginning of Chapter III to use the continuity equation to obtain $j = -v\frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi} \partial_x\phi$.

*This paper (pdf warning) has equation (2.12) relating $j = -\frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi} \partial_t\phi$. No motivation though.

*This paper first couples the theory to an electromagnetic potential with components $(a_0, a_x)$ at the boundary ($D_\mu = \partial_\mu + \sqrt{\nu}a_\mu$),
$$ S =  \int dt dx \frac{1}{4\pi}\left[D_t\phi D_x\phi - v_c (D_x\phi)^2\right]+\frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi}\epsilon^{\mu\lambda}a_{\mu}\partial_\lambda\phi$$
and defines the current through $J^\mu = \frac{\delta S}{\delta a_{\mu}}$ giving $J^\mu=(\frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi} D_x\phi, -v\frac{\sqrt{\nu}}{2\pi} D_x\phi)$.

So I notice that case 3 reduces to case 1 when $a_x = 0$. Furthermore, case 3 is gauge invariant, so this operator seems like a logical choice.
My problem with this choice is as follows: Consider a system with two edges (infininte quantum Hall bar) and suppose you have a non-zero potential along one edge, $a_t = U$ and $a_x = 0$ along this edge. You therefore expect a current to run through the system, because the edges are held at different potentials (and the current runs perpendicular to the potential difference, because of the quantum Hall relation). But: $\langle \partial_x \phi\rangle = 0$, so for case 1 and 3 there's no current.... Does that make case 2 the correct choice?
So perhaps the question comes down to: What operator represents the edge current? What operator is 'measured' in an experiment where the current is probed?

A: All the three forms agree with each other since, on the chiral edge, $\phi$ has a form $\phi(x,t)=\phi(x-vt)$ (as a time dependent operator).

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


Abstract: This study investigates the choice of applying hedge accounting among Malaysian listed companies in reporting their use of derivatives for hedging activities. Based on a sample of 300 Malaysian listed companies, we found that only 162 companies (54%) use derivatives to hedge their financial risk exposure and only 30% of those companies choose to apply hedge accounting. In addition, this study examines the relationship between company-specific characteristics and the choice to apply hedge accounting. The logistic regression results show that the decision to apply hedge accounting by Malaysian companies is positively influenced by company size and leverage. The implications of the findings are discussed and some conclusions are drawn.


text:
Incarceration Nation
Op-Eds/TV/Etc.
Peter K. Enns
Peter K. Enns is Professor in the Department of Government, Executive Director of the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, and Innaugural Co-Director of the Cornell Center for Social Sciences. He is also co-founder of Reality Check Insights. His research focuses on public opinion and political representation, mass incarceration and the legal system, and data analytics.
Enns has published two books—Incarceration Nation: How the United States Became the Most Punitive Democracy in the World and Who Gets Represented? (edited with Chris Wlezien)—and dozens of academic articles and op-eds. His research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, FWD.us, Koch Foundation, National Science Foundation, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Russell Sage Foundation. In 2017, he received the Emerging Scholar Award from the Elections, Public Opinion, and Voting Behavior section of the American Political Science Association, presented to the top scholar in the field within ten years of her or his doctorate.
Enns is currently on the Advisory Boards of the National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect and Cornell's Prison Education Program, and the Committee to Design the Cornell School of Public Policy. He has previously served as Faculty Director of Cornell's Prison Education Program, team leader of the Institute for Social Science theme project on the Causes, Consequences, and Future of Mass Incarceration in the United States, on the Provost's Data Science Task Force, and the Provost's Committee on Social Science Organizational Structures.
He received his Ph.D. in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his undergraduate degree from Colorado College. Prior to graduate school, he taught high school in Baltimore, MD, through Teach For America. He grew up in Canton, NY and Kingsburg, CA.
Telephone: (607) 255-3574 | Fax: (607) 255-4530 | Department of Government | peterenns@cornell.edu | @pete_enns


Discussion in 'Confirmed Event Discussion' started by HypnoHooves, 2 September 2017.
We don't have a formal PONY ONLY meet in september due to the comic con being on. But we can all co-ordinate attending and meet durring the event for a few drinks and chat.
Pony and non pony cosplay is of course encouraged.
Back to comic con for set events, talks and shopping as per schedule.
Note: THIS EVENT IS NOT AT DICE AND DONUTS. IT IS AROUND THE GUILD HALL NEAR THE BUS STATION.
Went to this last year, did you go? Not sure if I can make it this time but would be improved knowing other pones will be there.
couldnt go last year, but did the year before. planning going as dr whooves in clothes (david tennant dr with some additions) details of the oct meet and dec meet will be posted soon!
This looks really good, but will have to see about work commitments after tomorrow so will have to play it by ear. Nicholas Brendon, Robert Llewllyn and Dan Starkey are a very good lineup. I'll post here if I'm around.
HypnoHooves and ponePete like this.
Right, will be able to make this. Is the plan still to meet for drinks at 1.30?
it is the plan for those of us there.
Great, will see you at 1.30!


text:
What Do Employers Want to Hear in a Sales Interview?
by Lisa McQuerrey
Let your personality shine through during a sales interview.
1 Interview Questions for Sales Reps
2 Sales Job Interview Answers
3 Tips for Interviewing in Medical Sales
4 Really Make a Great Impression in a Sales Interview
Interviewing for a sales job involves bringing your most outgoing personality and having an in-depth knowledge of the company to which you're applying. Interviewers want to hear that you are motivated, responsible and personable. You also should bring along a resume that highlights your top sales accomplishments.
What You Bring to the Job
A sales job interviewer wants to know what sets you apart from other applicants. Outline the existing contacts you already have in the industry and your knowledge of various selling and closing processes. Detail the personality traits that make you an effective salesperson. This could include the ability to read people, to negotiate and to overcome objections.
What Your Background Entails
Interviewers want to hear about what type of sales jobs you've held in the past and what industries you are familiar with. They will want to hear about how long you have been working as a sales representative and what you liked and disliked about previous sales positions. They may also inquire as to why you left or are planning to leave your current role. Focus on the positive aspects of the company you are leaving and avoid talking negatively about previous employers. Instead, emphasize your desire to accept more-challenging roles.
What You Know About the Company
If you're going to be selling a company's products or services, you must have an in-depth knowledge of the company and its competition. Interviewers want to hear that you've researched the company and are familiar with its history, its offerings and its existing major clients. You can find a lot of this information on a company's website before your interview.
Who Your References Are
Include personal and professional references on your sales resume. A sales interviewer will want to hear from people whom know you and have worked with you in the past. This will help him verify your reputation, your work history and your abilities.
What Your Closing Rate is Like
It doesn't matter how knowledgeable or personable you are, an interviewer in a sales interview is going to want to hear about your closing rate and your ability to generate revenue. Be prepared to detail major client sales and instances where you overcame obstacles to secure a sale. Provide statistics that demonstrate how well you performed in other roles and how you stacked up to other sales representatives you worked with in the past.
Monster.com: Sales Careers
Irene Leonard; Self Promotion; How to Sell Yourself
Resume Edge; Expanding Your Resume; The Curriculum Vitae
Lisa McQuerrey has been a business writer since 1987. In 1994, she launched a full-service marketing and communications firm. McQuerrey's work has garnered awards from the U.S. Small Business Administration, the International Association of Business Communicators and the Associated Press. She is also the author of several nonfiction trade publications, and, in 2012, had her first young-adult novel published by Glass Page Books.
McQuerrey, Lisa. "What Do Employers Want to Hear in a Sales Interview?" Work - Chron.com, http://work.chron.com/employers-want-hear-sales-interview-7191.html. Accessed 16 July 2019.
McQuerrey, Lisa. (n.d.). What Do Employers Want to Hear in a Sales Interview? Work - Chron.com. Retrieved from http://work.chron.com/employers-want-hear-sales-interview-7191.html
McQuerrey, Lisa. "What Do Employers Want to Hear in a Sales Interview?" accessed July 16, 2019. http://work.chron.com/employers-want-hear-sales-interview-7191.html
Ace an Interview for Telemarketing
What Do You Get Asked in a Retail Job Interview?
Pharmaceutical Sales Interview Process Tips
Write a Retail Sales Position Cover Letter
Purchasing Interview Tips
Interview Questions & Answers for a Catering Sales Manager
Make a Sales Resume With Little Experience
How Much Can You Earn as a Sales Representative?
Things to Put on a Resume When Applying for Sales Merchandising
Call Center Interview Preparation
Customer Service Interview Preparation


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text:
Choose SaaS growth metrics
1. If your business is in the startup phase, figure out how many opportunities, leads, trials, Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs), traffic, and campaigns your company currently needs to achieve one deal or sale.
The purpose of looking at the bottom of the funnel closed deals and sales, is to find out the factors above and build your way up. You should be able to say something like, "For each $1 we put into this specific marketing campaign, we get a result of $5 in terms of revenue." Traditional marketing metrics such as Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR), Lifetime Value (LTV), or Customer Acquisition Costs (CAC), may be obsolete to look at in the beginning. It doesn't make sense to measure MRR if you have none, and it's not worth calculating LTV or CAC, if you still lack sufficient data. For example, SaaS startup CandyBar set a content strategy that prioritized long-term potential like foundational and evergreen articles, over short-term returns, and experimented with different content types to see which would earn more shares and links.
2. Ask your marketing team to segment site visitors by the amount of interest they've shown to identify quality leads for the sales team, and review closed deals or sales to refine the segmentation process.
Divide all visitors into three MQLs: Maybe Not: Those people who just like your content. May Be Interested to Buy: Who may convert in the future after more marketing effort. Warm Them Up: Interacting with the CTA and ripe to add as SQL. See whether the content is compelling site visitors and email subscribers to make the leap into sales conversions, or if they just stick with a free trial of the product. Look at product qualified leads (PQLs), as the MQL/SQL model can be highly subjective, rule-based, and relies on basic activities like website visits, email opens, webinars, and gated content downloads. Identify product-qualified leads based on their behavior within your SaaS product. As many as 90% of MQLs never turn into Sales Qualified Leads because they were tagged as MQLs too early in the buyer's journey.
3. Monitor conversions by lead source to learn which sources generate the most high-quality leads in terms of sales and ROI.
For instance, when you run an A/B test, take the extra step to measure how leads performed throughout the buyer lifecycle instead of assuming the variant that drove most leads is the winner. A page driving record numbers of leads does not necessarily translate into success for your business. Take into account form submissions that led to SQL and increasing sales, but also those that didn't to determine campaign success.
4. Use both lead scoring and behavioral triggers when handling the SQL to sales teams.
Use lead scoring as an essential tool to avoid passing leads that are not ready to buy to your sales team, and also to highlight leads that need more nurturing in your sales funnel. Sales reps need information on what leads have been doing recently so that they can guide the conversation appropriately when talking to them. Sales don't need this intelligent thing that says 'this lead is 66% more likely to buy,' because they can't use that to communicate with the prospect. Instead, sales reps need to know that the lead recently installed the trial version of the product, so they can reach out to them and say 'Hey, you just installed. What are you looking to do next?"
5. Choose a single metric like monthly revenue growth or retention rate to focus on and track as a measure of success.
This is known as a North Star metric, because it's your primary guide. The overwhelming advice from industry leaders is to keep it simple and follow a less is more principle. For example, Ahrefs used three analytics platforms to track conversions, Kissmetrics, Mixpanel, and Woopra, where each platform was fed with the same data; CMO Tim Suolo and team found out all three analytics platforms provided different conversion numbers at different steps of the funnel. Practice showed the Ahrefs team that reducing analytics reporting to a single North Star Metric was more useful. Hence, they kept on sticking with just tracking only monthly revenue growth for their product with it.
6. Focus on growing the loyalty of your early subscribers, not just their raw numbers.
"After getting your first 100 users, don't only focus on getting your next 100. Figure out how to make the product so good that most of the first 100 will stay for 5 years." Jeff Chang. Some 55% of SaaS companies rank customer retention as their key metric to measure, which puts a spotlight on churn. For a SaaS company with a hundred customers, two customers churning isn't going to make a change. However, churn compounds. If you have half-million customers, that 2% churn rate that wasn't a problem at the start, translates into a monthly loss of 10,000 subscribers. Replacing that many customers can be unsustainable.
7. When your company is in a growth phase, use the Net Dollar Retention (NDR) metric to bring to the surface issues that otherwise may go unnoticed.
NDR is the percentage of growth a company has after accounting for churn, upgrades, and downgrades. For high-growth private SaaS companies, the median NDR is 101%. That figure mirrors the average for SaaS companies that reach an IPO; NDR also hovers over the 100% mark for acquisitions. Net dollar retention has a huge impact on the long-term success of a business; companies that go public usually have net dollar retention rates of well over 100%, and in some cases 150%+. "A SaaS company could be growing ARR (annual recurring revenue) over 100% each year, but if their annualized NDR is less than 75%, there is likely a problem with the underlying business." – Alex Clayton. "If you're at ~106%, you're in line with the average. If you're below 100%, do a little work to figure out what's happening. If you're ~120%+, you're in great company." – Sammy Abdullah.


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Q: Using Tensorflow Dataset in Keras The Tensorflow package tensorflow-datasets has an extensive set of datasets.
I could do tfds.list_builders() to see the entire list of datasets, and then use one of them like:
import tensorflow_datasets as tfds
emnist_train = tfds.load(name="emnist", split=tfds.Split.TRAIN, as_supervised=True)
emnist_test  = tfds.load(name="emnist", split=tfds.Split.TEST,  as_supervised=True)

How do I use emnist_train and emnist_test which was imported with tfds.load with keras load_data()

A: You can load your data like this
emnist_train = tfds.load(name="emnist", split=tfds.Split.TRAIN, batch_size=-1 )
emnist_test = tfds.load(name="emnist", split=tfds.Split.TEST, batch_size=-1)

emnist_train = tfds.as_numpy(emnist_train)
emnist_test = tfds.as_numpy(emnist_test)

x_train, y_train = emnist_train["image"], emnist_train["label"]
x_test, y_test = emnist_test["image"], emnist_test["label"]


The subject of skin tone and beauty has been prevalent within the black community for decades. Nxsh decides to depict people with darker skin tone in certain images to challenge perceptions of dark skin tone within the black community and society. An issue that may seem outdated but is still currently playing a part in the way many people think today.