text:
Q: How to change color to a specific part of a loaded glb model in three.js? I have designed an furnace and implemented into web. i have 4 meshes in my blender. I need to change only the inner furnace color according to the value entered into the threshold box say if 500 entered then till 100 i need green 100>threshold>500 yellow and when == 500 red color appears inside.
Now we have made the bg blink when the value reaches the threshold value. Could you suggest a solution to change only the inner color of the furnace? Use this github code to alterate https://github.com/Aarthi160802/Digital-twin/tree/kishore
Any example in jsfiddle is appreciated
Javascript code
import * as THREE from "./three.js-master/build/three.module.js";
import { GLTFLoader } from "./three.js-master/examples/jsm/loaders/GLTFLoader.js";
import { OrbitControls } from "./three.js-master/examples/jsm/controls/OrbitControls.js";

const MODEL_PATH = "assets/furnace.glb";
const ALERT_SOUND_PATH = "assets/alert.mp3";
const ALERT_BACKGROUND_TEXTURE_PATH = "assets/red_bg.png";
const NORMAL_BACKGROUND_TEXTURE_PATH = "assets/white_bg.png";

const SCREEN_DIMENSIONS = {
  width: window.innerWidth,
  height: window.innerHeight,
};

const MAX_VALUE = 2000;

const BLINK_RATE = 3;
const CURRENT_VALUE_INCREMENT_RATE = 0.5;

const scene = new THREE.Scene();
const canvas = document.querySelector(".webgl");

const alert_sound = new Audio(ALERT_SOUND_PATH);

let normal_background_texture, alert_background_texture;

const load_3d_model = (model_path) => {
  const model_loader = new GLTFLoader();

  model_loader.load(
    model_path,
    function (glb) {
      const root = glb.scene;
      root.scale.set(0.007, 0.007, 0.007);
      scene.add(root);
    },
    function (xhr) {
      console.log(
        `Model: ${((xhr.loaded / xhr.total) * 100).toFixed(2)}% loaded`
      );
    },
    function (error) {
      console.error("An error occurred while loading the model.");
      console.error(error);
    }
  );
};

const load_background_textures = (normal_texture_path, alert_texture_path) => {
  const alert_background_loader = new THREE.TextureLoader();
  alert_background_loader.load(alert_texture_path, function (texture) {
    alert_background_texture = texture;
  });

  const normal_background_loader = new THREE.TextureLoader();
  normal_background_loader.load(normal_texture_path, function (texture) {
    normal_background_texture = texture;
    scene.background = normal_background_texture;
  });
};

const load_lighting = () => {
  const hemisphereLight = new THREE.HemisphereLight(0xffffff, 4.5);
  scene.add(hemisphereLight);

  const directionalLight = new THREE.DirectionalLight(0xfbfcf6, 4.5);
  scene.add(directionalLight);
};

const load_camera = () => {
  const camera = new THREE.PerspectiveCamera(
    45,
    SCREEN_DIMENSIONS.width / SCREEN_DIMENSIONS.height,
    0.1,
    1000
  );
  camera.position.set(2, 2.1, 2);
  scene.add(camera);

  return camera;
};

const load_renderer = () => {
  const renderer = new THREE.WebGL1Renderer({
    canvas: canvas,
    antialias: true,
    alpha: true,
  });

  renderer.setSize(SCREEN_DIMENSIONS.width, SCREEN_DIMENSIONS.height);
  renderer.setPixelRatio(Math.min(window.devicePixelRatio, 2));
  renderer.updateShadowMap.enabled = false;
  renderer.gammaOutput = true;

  return renderer;
};

const load_controls = (camera, renderer) => {
  const controls = new OrbitControls(camera, renderer.domElement);
  controls.enablePan = false;
  controls.enableDamping = true;

  return controls;
};

function animate(camera, renderer, controls, threshold) {
  let current_value = 0;
  let current_blink_value = 0;

  const _animate = () => {
    if (current_value < threshold) {
      alert_sound.pause();
    } else if (current_value >= threshold && current_value <= MAX_VALUE) {
      alert_sound.play();

      if (current_blink_value < 60) {
        scene.background = normal_background_texture;
      } else if (current_blink_value >= 60) {
        scene.background = alert_background_texture;
      }

      current_blink_value += BLINK_RATE;
      if (current_blink_value > 120) {
        current_blink_value = 0;
      }
    }

    controls.update();

    if (current_value <= MAX_VALUE) {
      requestAnimationFrame(_animate);
    }
    renderer.render(scene, camera);

    current_value += CURRENT_VALUE_INCREMENT_RATE;
    console.log(`Current Value: ${current_value}`);
    console.log(`current_blink_value Value: ${current_blink_value}`);
  };

  _animate();
}

function main() {
  let threshold;

  // 1. Loading the 3D model.
  load_3d_model(MODEL_PATH);

  // 2. Load background textures.
  load_background_textures(
    NORMAL_BACKGROUND_TEXTURE_PATH,
    ALERT_BACKGROUND_TEXTURE_PATH
  );

  // 3. Load Lighting
  load_lighting();

  // 4. Load Camera
  const camera = load_camera();

  // 5. Load Renderer
  const renderer = load_renderer();

  // 6. Load controller
  const controls = load_controls(camera, renderer);

  const onSubmit = (event) => {
    // Prevents Browser from refreshing after clicking submit button
    event.preventDefault();

    threshold = parseInt(document.getElementById("thresholdInput").value);
    //scene.background = new THREE.Color(0xf8f8ff);

    animate(camera, renderer, controls, threshold);
  };

  document
    .getElementById("thresholdSubmitButton")
    .addEventListener("click", onSubmit);
}

main();


I am for 'triad framework'! – Okolobi!
I have said elsewhere that, in 'compliance' with the Paris Declaration on Aid effectiveness and in the interest of optimal utilisation of limited resources, a 'triad framework' is needed in Africa. The proposed framework encourages countries to establish: i. one national youth development coordinating body; ii. one national strategy framework for youth development and iii. one monitoring, evaluation and data management framework.
The triad framework is not novel in that it draws extensively from UNAIDS' 'three-one's principle' which proposes similar mechanisms for HIV/AIDS efforts at national level. Like HIV/AIDS, youth development remains a salient aspect of national development in Africa, is multidimensional and requires a multi-sectoral approach. Thus it requires better coordination in order to maximise the impact of resources expended across sectors.
The current 'youth sector' is beset with many challenges. Its extensive implementation focus on what is mostly termed 'youth empowerment and inclusion' implementing programmes mainly aimed at enhancing youth 'participation' in economic and political domains of their societies, exemplifies its limited scope in actual delivery of programmes and services. This is because the 'sectoral departments/ ministries' do not have the mandate or means to implement the various thematic issues (for example education or health) proposed in the countries' respective national youth policies and inter-departmental cooperation in this regard has remained the exception rather than the norm.
This leads me to question what the role of the youth departments should really be. Should it be coordination? Implementation? Monitoring and Evaluation? All of these roles? If so, do the current departments have the necessary capacity and competent staff to man these roles?
Within a triad framework, countries could establish a national youth development coordination body, which would in partnership with other departments, agencies and the youth themselves identify and provide strategic direction for youth policy, harness and effectively utilise existing capacities and resources, monitor and evaluate youth policy outcomes and outputs, and ensure that available resources are effectively utilised.
The proposal for a triad framework is not full-proof, as experience with the three ones principle and aid harmonisation efforts have shown that such initiatives could be fraught with various challenges. One of the foreseeable challenges is political 'protectionism' with each sector attempting to guard its control over resources. Several other challenges are identifiable, however, existing efforts agree with the fact that the benefits of better coordination far outweigh the challenges.
In the final analysis, the aim is for the optimal utilisation of scarce resources, reducing the amount of duplication across government departments and relevant development partners, improve the collection and management of disaggregated youth development data and increase the achievement of better youth policy outcomes.


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a FW 400 drive will faithfully playback 24 tracks of audio,(probably more) so you don't need a FW800 drive.
I tried last night computer<external hard drive via 800 to 800 cable<project mix via 400 to 800 adapter.
it did. not. work. project mix was recognized by computer but couldn't produce sound and kept making a repeated clicking sound.
anyone know what i'm doing wrong here?
i also looked into esata expansion cards for the macbookpro and i couldn't find a single one that had a good reputation. most seem unreliable and prone to crashing the computer.
you could always get a FW400 expansion card and use that to run your PM. Like this. if it will fit your mac. I use one of these on my pc laptop and it works like a charm.
I'd be curious to know where you are seeing the info that these cards are unreliable.
Go here, check out their offerings, then call them for their advice. OWC is much beloved and trusted in the Mac community..
Did you try my first suggestion for using a USB hub with your current drives that are working?
Does the FW 800 drive work fine without the interface attached? It could well be that Avid support was trying to get you to use a real FW400 port on a drive - but the drive you have does not have that. If that is what support wanted, you could force the entire chain down to FireWire 400 -- but no guarantee this will work. One idea is try plugging FW800 to FW400 adapter into the disk drive and another adapter into the Mac FW800 port and connecting with a FW400 cable (or some permutation of adapter cables as long as somewhere in the chain the signal goes to FW400). I would use the Sonnos Firewire adapters, I've had others not work.
Yes I would avoid eSata. Unless you really needed the extra performance, which you don't here. And if you do go with the high-end Sonnos card (same company as above). But Avid won't call that a supported config/drive either.
Remember I mentioned that what I would try first is a USB hub with the least I/O busy external drive sharing the hub with the iLok.
You've never actually said how much IO is going on on these drives, if its not a lot then another option would be to put the samples on the system drive. Again not as good as a separate drive but it may work.
Did I mention that what I would try first is a USB hub with the least I/O busy external drive sharing the hub with the iLok.
He was talking about eSATA and you seem to be linking to a page on Firewire cards. If you think there are not often problems with eSATA cards in MacBook Pros I have a bridge for sale. But the high end Sonnos card (not the cheaper one) is the one I would use if needed, but I would not go there for a Pro Tools system.
i still like my idea better. Get the FW400 card for the PM, connect the FW 800 drive to the 800 port on the Macbook and leave the USB ports for what ever you needed. Then use a hub for iLoks and other peripherals. You could then chain 2 FW 800 drives or and a FW400 drive to the card. more possibilities.
would a FW400 card be more reliable than an eSATA card? I bought an eSATA card but, just as people complained about, it crashed my computer right in the middle of a session. LUCKILY both the drive and session were in tact, but clearly this card is not worth messing with. I'll keep it for the occasional data transfer, but its just not worth running the risk of having sessions crash.
Anyways, i'm left with two options: 1) tinkering with the daisy-chain thing (it didn't work before) or 2) getting a FW400 card and hoping it is more reliable than the esATA card. Does anyone have any suggestions for a RELIABLE FW400 card?
Concerning the daisy chaining, I realized that the reason it probably didn't work is because i'm using a g-technology drive that doesn't have any FW400 ports. So what I was doing was running the PM via a 400-800 adapter into the G-tech drive, and then out of there 800-800. Clearly this isn't how it should be done, i must need a drive with a FW400 port. Would you agree? Anyone have any suggestions for one of those that is good for pro tools?
I can't believe it is such a hassle to connect an interface and a hard drive to my mac book pro!


NFL star, who plays for Detroit Lions, Ezekiel "Ziggy" Ansah is returning to Ghana to host his second annual Ezekiel Ansah Football Camp.
The camp will take place on Saturday, 23rd June 2018, at the Presbyterian Boys Senior High School.
The aim of the camp is to introduce a set of skills often thought in the sports of American football while promoting the importance of physical education, teamwork and demonstrating the discipline to work hard towards one's goals.
Last year, the turnout was amazing. Over 500 young people, came together to play the sport that Ziggy fell in love with in the US.
With hard work, dedication and support from family and friends, Ziggy was able to capitalize on an opportunity to travel to the United States to further his education and pursue his athletic dreams, eventually becoming one of the most successful Defensive Ends in the National Football League.
Throughout his journey, while Ziggy has been grateful for all the opportunities that he has received, he has always known that the key to his accomplishments lie within him.
Ziggy is passionate about giving back both to the community in Ghana that gave him his foundation as well as the community he has come to love in the US.
The Ezekiel Ansah Foundation is a non-for profit organisation that strongly believes that with the right support and opportunity, they can steer youth on the right path and help them realize that they are, in fact, the answer to their own success.
The camp is proudly sponsored by the Detroit Lions, Nike, Forever Young Foundation, Creative Pak, Riddle and Kwese Free Sports.
Ezekiel attended Presbyterian Boys' Senior Secondary School (PRESEC) and graduated to study Actuarial Science, majored in Statistics at the Brigham Young University (BYU). He was drafted by the Detroit Lions in the 2013 National Football League (NFL) Draft. His jersey number is 94 and plays the defensive end.


Registration for Garmin products includes GPS devices, sports and fitness trackers, Garmin outdoor devices, marine products, and phone.
, customers will get updates from Garmin, special offers from the company, and technical updates related to their devices. Registering a Garmin devices online only takes a few minutes, and can be done totally online. To register a Garmin device online, users will need to have the device in hand because they'll need to enter the serial number from it. In some cases, users will also need a USB device to connect to a computer.
Garmin is a technology company that was founded in 1989 and has an annual revenue of almost $3 billion. Today, Garmin is most known for their wearable fitness tracking devices, but the company was most well known for their GPS devices. Garmin currently competes mostly with companies like FitBit. Garmin currently employs about 10,000 people around the world.


WASHINGTON —Jan 03, 2019 — The Justice Department says there's an ongoing grand jury investigation related to a Russian social media troll farm accused of interfering in the 2016 presidential election.
That's according to a court filing Thursday from prosecutors with special counsel Robert Mueller's office and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington.
Mueller's office last February indicted three Russian individuals and three Russian companies accused in a social media effort to sway American public opinion ahead of the election.
Continue reading WASHINGTON | US: Active grand jury probe tied to Russian social media at STL.News.


text:
Tatjana Panowa (ur. 13 sierpnia 1976 w Moskwie) – rosyjska tenisistka.

W 1992 roku rozegrała swoje pierwsze turnieje w rozgrywkach cyklu ITF, z czego jeden wygrała. Dwa lata później wygrała aż cztery turnieje w grze singlowej w ciągu jednego roku. W sumie odniosła sześć zwycięstw w grze singlowej w turniejach tej rangi. W 1994 roku zadebiutowała także w rozgrywkach cyklu WTA, na turnieju w Moskwie. Pomimo że nie odniosła żadnych zwycięstw rozgrywkach WTA, to zapisała się w historii tenisa kilkoma efektownymi zwycięstwami nad zawodniczkami z pierwszej dwudziestki a nawet dziesiątki światowego rankingu. Pokonała między innymi takie zawodniczki jak: Amanda Coetzer, Brenda Schultz-McCarthy, Lisa Raymond, Nathalie Tauziat, Jelena Diemientjewa, Arantxa Sánchez Vicario czy Jennifer Capriati. W efekcie, we wrześniu 2002 roku, osiągnęła 20. miejsce światowego rankingu WTA w grze singlowej i było to jej najwyższe miejsce w karierze.

W rozgrywkach wielkoszlemowych brała udział we wszystkich turniejach, w każdym z nich dochodząc kilkakrotnie do trzeciej rundy.

Była także mocnym punktem w reprezentacji kraju w rozgrywkach Pucharu Federacji, wygrywając dwanaście spośród piętnastu meczów, które rozegrała.

Finały turniejów WTA

Gra pojedyncza

Gra podwójna

Wygrane turnieje rangi ITF

Gra pojedyncza

Bibliografia

Rosyjskie tenisistki
Ludzie urodzeni w Moskwie
Urodzeni w 1976

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
94571487398d478729acb57a2ffeb1c2
A day at El Pinal
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Located northeast of Sacramento, California, the city of Roseville has been an important railroad town since the buildin…
A day at Stockton
Located in the heart of California's Central Valley, the city of Stockton is a railfan's paradise. Several major Union P…
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HO DCC Installs Vol 1
Installing DCC in HO Scale Locomotives Digital Command Control offers myriad advantages over using simple direct curr…
Digital Command Control (DCC) has revolutionized the operation of model trains, offering a level of precise control of m…
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Weathering is one of the easiest ways to improve the appearance of a freight car. A nice weathering job can turn an aver…
UP & CNW Geneva Sub Vol 2

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Music Production, Hip Hop, Life, Love and Observations..
Life in the Cloud and what it Means.
So the great move into the cloud is on.. we are being ushered into a new age whether or is that 'weather' we like it or not!
We are being sold on the idea of convenience, we are being asked to entrust all our important personal data and it's wellbeing over to corporations for safekeeping. Whether it's photo collections of your memories or data used by critical software for your work, the future is that the resources you require, store, save, cherish? Will be stashed away in the cloud for your retrieval when you need them.. Saving desktop real estate, memory resources in your ever smaller devices, soon you'll just need the Google Glass, the Touch Devices and passwords… Maybe not the passwords… Iris or voice recognition.. Fingerprint? DNA?
However…. what happens when something goes wrong?
This last week something went wrong.
It might seem marginal, it was specific to a relatively small niche sector, it was nothing that wiped billions off of an index or collapsed a bank… but nevertheless..
PACE ant piracy protection, iLok as it's commonly known, launched it's new revised system, website and app for protecting audio software against piracy, It is nothing new but for those that don't know it involves the companies that use this system selling you a license to use their products. This license is then downloaded from the iLok website and placed onto your USB 'dongle' which must be plugged into your machine to operate the software you have paid for.
The license database is held in the cloud on the iLok/PACE servers, millions of users own and operate software protected by iLok in studio setups worldwide, from bedroom users all the way through semi pro setups to the huge industry standard facilities..
This last week saw the iLok servers have problems, their new License Manager App has been plagued with performance issues, their server update reportedly had a major problem..
The result was, like myself, a vast number of people people had major problems too, we had no access to the software we'd paid for, people couldn't work, facilities cancelled clients, suddenly the dependency fostered upon us all became apparent.
If they screw up… We all get screwed up… I watched the discussion and rage unfold on the forums, the customer relations were non existent, to be fair i guess the PACE folks were losing the plot trying to fix this stuff.. but communication was near zero.. and the disdain people were feeling was through the roof..
Support tickets were replied to with the same generic responses, kinda like the recorded message that reassures you that 'your call is important to us' yet they take forever to answer… if there's a real person there at all.
Following a long convoluted solution someone (not from iLok) posted online and with much patience as the License Manager app repeatedly timed out and froze, with many restarts and after six or more hours waiting for it to complete 'operation in progress' at a snails 'pace' (sic) I was nearly back to normal, I do still have problems opening 64bit plugins without a crazy wait time on loading though..
Many people do however still have massive issues days later.. lost revenue.. lost time.. lost inspiration..
But no one is answerable.. the cloud is above all… it's not just PACE… if this was another database of critical importance.. like if the bank suddenly decided you have no money? Or your credit report goes south… someone should be answerable right?
'Computer says no' is fast becoming a scary reality and there is a distinct possibility our whole lives will become automated by algorithms with people only present to make you feel more comfortable with the fact..like a flesh and bone interface front end.. the cold steel of the cpu behind issuing the automated response.. the company policy.
The corporations are the masters… The people are the subjects..
The response from people online over the iLok debacle has been interesting, three camps.
The first defend the system citing that nothing has gone wrong for them before or that they have been unaffected by this therefore everyone else is over reacting..
The second are the crew who always objected to the intrusive nature of the PACE system, the fact it writes weird files to your system it needn't and collects data etc, the lack of customer care..
The third are like myself who use the iLok, are happy to pay for software and understand the need to prevent piracy yet having gone through this experience will no longer be so willing to support or purchase products that use this kind of system anymore.. There are other means to protect against piracy.
These events have shown me..
I don't want to depend on the cloud, unseen hands that i need to believe have my best interests at heart are a common re-accurence in modern life.. I don't mind having my 'stuff' on multiple hardrives, i want the choice to manage my own data..
I don't want to wake up one morning or half way through a project and find all my stuff or tools have been stolen, deleted, frozen or disabled through no fault of my own..
This last few days has been a warning.. a brief glimpse into what we are setting ourselves up to become if we blindly accept and adopt every new idea thrown at us without the thought of consequence..
The cloud dependancy however marks a shift in power.. when someone or something you can never hold accountable has the ability to wipe you out of the virtual world it will be a different ballgame..
Access denied, Credit refused, Files missing, Software not authorised, Data no longer available.. ….to you that is!
Your data in the cloud can be intercepted, stolen, misused, sold, copied, analysed, altered and deleted and you'd know nothing about it before it's too late..
They used to say it didn't exist if you didn't have three backups!
Soon you won't even have one.
Lost Legends and Music in the Age of Information..
As time rolls on through infinity one realises the small division of the endlessness that our lifespan actually occupies.
Popular culture changes, fashions come and go, sometimes to return again.. Flared jeans might have to wait a while now that skinny jeans are in vogue once more.. Or drainpipes as they were called in my mums day.. But you never know when some hip trendsetter will re-ignite their reign of designer terror upon us all..
Technology however is rarely unimplemented and the obsolete rarely returns for more than a brief nostalgic flash of defiance.. VHS is an ancient ancestor to Vimeo and the idea of the cassette tape is laughable in the era of the iPod like an abacus to a quad core… even technology that arguably has had a negative affect on us is rarely reversed..
Everything now happens at a speed never historically seen before, the world is getting smaller, people's access to entertainment and interest in the media around us is at an all time high..
Yet the longterm quality appears to be falling, correct me if I'm wrong, but particularly within music it feels as though we are losing legends year on year but they are not being replaced? Is this actually a result of the technology we now use? Is it the means of delivery by which our current crop of musical expression reaches its audience? Or is it that the audience itself has evolved or mutated together with how we use and appreciate the medium of music itself?
A retrospective look at the music of passed legends like James Brown, Marvin Gaye, Hendrix, Tupac, John Lennon, Bob Marley.. The re-emergence of David Bowie, Madness, The Rolling Stones, even the endurance of Jay-Z at the summit of rap's mountain, the continued touring from the likes of Public Enemy.. All suggest a proven potential lasting power into the decades that it somehow feels hard to imagine attributing to a lot of the music released currently.. Why?
Maybe in the passage of time I'll be proven wrong and people will be lauding A$AP Rocky with the same enduring praise as Curtis Mayfield? Don't get it twisted, I like new music and dig Kendrick Lamar, A$AP and plenty of current music, I'm even really enjoying the new Daft Punk album (mainly cos it sounds like Chic) but somehow it seems as though it's all a little temporary, as though it's all good until next month when something else will be trending..
Meanwhile Time Magazine named Bob Marley's Exodus the album of the century, this year is the 36th anniversary of its release..
When i looked through Rolling Stones Top 100 artists ever, they were nearly all ancient barring the inclusion of one or two rappers such as Jay-Z and The Beastie Boys and Eminem, mostly it was music i've heard all my life and before, music that has withstood time enough to define it's own legacy..
It's not literally like good music is not being made anymore though, Obviously I'm not suggesting something as stupid as that.. Just that our means of interacting with the music we are exposed to and thus enjoying (or not) is so different than ever before that it makes it harder to imagine anything lasting for decades like it has in the past no matter how good… will these current artists be allowed to stay relevant , grow with their music, can you see them twelve albums deep?
There's a worldwide audience, with a billion choices and a fifteen second attention threshold, how is the young hopeful going to have a career spanning decades?
The mainstream supported artists like those mentioned earlier have a big push from the established industry machine.. But the machine is not what it was and neither is the audience or the means of delivery.. The equation has changed but the maths teacher hasn't noticed.. the class are no longer paying attention.. Life is expensive, life is cheap, a career needs success which is defined by money, if it don't make dollars it don't make sense.. Back to the grind, the day job.. So music becomes the day job, the daily grind at the expense of integrity?
Music has always at its root been a cultural reflection in some way, but it has now been mostly relegated to 'content'… In the 'rap game' (sic) most new contestants enter into the creative endeavour to chase wealth and a lifestyle, the image is more important than the substance but without substance the structure is hollow and brittle.. Sure it might be shiny but when it caves in it won't be back… It'll be replaced!
I know there's a difference between artistic creation and hustle, I admire the entrepreneurs who are making it work financially but that's a different subject… Not everyone can sell headphones..
But where is the music that speaks for the people, the world is in turmoil and financial crisis has spread far and wide, wars are the norm, terrorism lurks, culture conflict and oppression are prevalent… Political scandal and lies engulf the west, deprivation and booming slave labour economies dominate the east..
However the fact is that in the world of X-Factor armchair A&R and YouTube attention span deficit, Flash in the pan Twitter trend led pursuit of the hours hottest hashtag…. There is less and less chance of meaningful music being a viable choice instinctive or calculated for the ones coming up with their dreams of 'making it'… Unless a conscious decision to do so is made somehow..
I think young musicians and singers, rappers, poets etc deserve better, they deserve a budget and need to be re-aligned with the concept of music belonging to us the people,creatively reflecting us and not the imaginary lifestyle and mis-sold dream of the escape from us, the world is not a crime scene, not everyone is going to be a picture perfect millionaire, we won't all get the girl in the end of our movie… We may have to fight to win.
I wish everyone the best of luck and fully support new music I hear that hits me in the right places.. Who feels it knows it… When it hits you, you feel no pain..
I know this has been a bit of a ramble.. It could be better written but I hope you catch my vibe..
Zen Capitalism And The World We Create With Our Thoughts..
'With our thoughts we create the world' said the Buddha.. well it's true, except just sitting around thinking about stuff doesn't amount to anything without action right?
Remember Tony Blair and his smug smile as millions marched against the Iraq war while he pointed at us as a shining example of how great freedom under democracy was… Then followed the shock and awe campaign and the '7 day' war that lasted a decade?
But what can us little individuals do to change it if we don't like it? How do we find time to contribute towards a positive change whilst we find ourselves in an endless pursuit of money to ensure our own level of comfort and survival..
Maybe a future Buddha or Zen revolutionary would suggest we could change everything by merely doing what we do anyway but just a little different..
The truth is that we allow these things we disagree with to happen, we vote for them every day, we support them because we fund them..
We donate money to help save animals from cruelty whilst buying products tested needlessly on animals..
We can find horse meat and even traces of 'unknown' animal DNA present in processed food sold for human consumption and bought mainly by the lower income consumer or people to busy to cook for themselves from scratch..
We love our own children but support the abuse of the child workforce elsewhere who are paid virtually nothing to work in terrible conditions in far away lands manufacturing the clothes our children wear to look cool.. The poor might need those jobs, but these corporations profits are huge, they could easily pay more ethical rates and provide better conditions if they cared at all..
SO WHAT DO ALL THESE THINGS HAVE IN COMMON AND WHAT CAN BE DONE?
CAPITALISM IS BOTH THE PROBLEM AND THE SOLUTION!
WE NEED TO USE CONSUMERISM AS A REVOLUTIONARY TOOL FOR CHANGE!
INSTEAD CHANGE HOW YOU SPEND YOUR MONEY!
We give the elite, selfish and the greedy the power by spending our money where we do… They way we do, the way they want us to.
You want more non violent video games? Buy non violent video games and make them more profitable than the others..
Tired of rap music promoting senselessness and in intelligence? Seek out the music speaking your cause, reflecting our lives and support it, make it the more viable economic choice for the purveyors of the product.
Don't wanna eat horses and GMO food that is poison? Buy the opposite, read the labels and vote against Monsanto with your money and buy the food that is better for you, bring the price of organic and natural produce down by increasing the demand.. Put the poisoners out of business!
Buy clothes from companies that support your community or treat workers better, even the lesser of two evils is a conscious and positive choice, wear Puma not Nike, rock Stussy not Gucci.
YOUR MONEY AND HOW YOU SPEND IT IS THE ONLY TRUE POLITICAL POWER YOU HAVE LEFT! USE YOUR CONSUMER POWER TO SHAPE YOUR WORLD!
If you don't like them, hit them where it hurts..in their pocket.. Put them out of business every chance you get..
If those millions of people stopped buying Coca Cola for six weeks the financial implications would rock the world..
WE HOLD THE POWER IN OUR HANDS EVERY DAY!
WE ARE NOT SLAVES TO THE BANKERS JUST BECAUSE THEY ISSUE THE NOTES!
TAKE BACK OUR POWER, WE EARN IT, WE SPEND IT, WITH A LITTLE MORE THOUGHT WE CAN CREATE THE WORLD WITH IT!
Just my humble opinion and thoughts for the morning… If you enjoy, agree or whatever, pass it on..
Like this stuff if you like..


With Mother's Day fast approaching, I couldn't think of a more adorable book to perch on Mum's breakfast-in-bed tray. Small format and beautifully illustrated, as only Mr Carle knows how, it would look so special alongside heartfelt tea and toast.
Inside is just as much a delight, with our dear little familiar caterpillar paying visit to a variety of animal mums and babies, from roos to owls and elephants.
Along with each animal, the text enforces something they are pretty much renowned for ... penguins who hold babies close, owls who pass on wisdom.
Told in the second person, the book also allows the young narrator to admit that even when they are snappy (like a crocodile) or monkeying around (like a ... er ... monkey), mum is always there to help them find their feet (like a baby giraffe).
Adorable, gorgeous text and even more gorgeous illustrations.


At least it's gonna be around here.
In my efforts to tame the mountainous fabric collection I'm blessed to be in possession of, I shot off my mouth and said I plan to make at least 25 scrap quilts this year.
Some of them are already started, and hiding amongst my UFOs and WIPs.
Lots of them can be made from the scraps that I pre-cut into shapes and sizes, so they're as good as started, if I just pick the perfect pattern.
I'm setting aside more time this year to work on things of my own, AND to put some of my own quilts into my longarm schedule.
I recently finished getting all my fabric organized into the tubs under my cutting table. However, there is still one box of fabric that won't fit in this location, so my intent is to use up enough fabric that my entire stash fits into these bins (and also to have fewer bins under there, too). A lofty goal, indeed.
I also have several large bags of scraps, and two big tubs, that I'm working my way through, and I hope to have those gone by year's end as well.
So . . . while sorting the scraps, I cut the smallest pieces into useable sizes and put them into these smaller bins of pre-cuts. I mostly use Bonnie Hunter's Scrap Users System for this, altho I think I cut even more shapes and sizes than she does. I can do a more in-depth post on my pre-cuts later on, if you're interested in seeing exactly how I do mine.
Anyway, I've processed so many of the scraps that the lids won't fit on some of those bins now, so it's time to actually use the pre-cuts. Last year, I used up all my 2 1/2″ squares in a couple of scrap quilts, so I'm good there, but the lid wouldn't fit on the bin of 3 1/2″ strips.
About the same time I discovered that problem, my friend, Amanda Jean at Crazy Mom Quilts, posted THIS sweet project that she had just finished, and told how she did it!
So I just yanked that bin off the shelf and went through it and cut enough pieces from those strips for TWO quilts like this. I'm doing one in all bright-colored scraps, and the other is more planned out with red, tan, and navy to be used as a quilt for my guild's Veteran's quilts project. I have the top of the first one finished, and am working on piecing the bright one.
Scrap quilts go really fast, and they can be used as leader/ender projects for other things you're sewing on. I have pieced entire scrap quilts as leader/ender projects. It's like a bonus!
With my renewed dedication to spending more time sewing for myself this coming year, I think I can make this happen. Now to go through the UFOs and pick one to concentrate on so I can knock it off my list. I'll pick one and show you later this week what I'll be working on.
What fun project have you started your year off with?
You probably already know that I love scrap quilts. It is mostly all I make because the majority of my fabric is other people's leftovers. I don't mind at all. It gives quilts a texture and depth that you can't get any other way. To start the year I am working on twin baby quilts (scrappy, naturally) for the recently born twins of my husband's manager. Fabric already cut (2-1/2″ squares). Just had to color sort, pick a background and start stitching.
Well, cool year ahead! I'll love seeing all these, since I'm crazy about scrap quilts. Amanda Jean does come up with a lot of good idea. My vortex has been on the back burner, but it will have to come back out and get finished this year.
I finished piecing the backing for two quilts today. What a good feeling! I see from "tracking" e-mails that my stash builder neutrals for the En Provence should be here tomorrow or the next day! Anyone else have fun the day after Christmas spending a gift certificate? Perfect? Right!! My list is on the wall and if I am diligent I will check off two things this month! Thank you thank you thank you for the encouraging challenge. One of the things I have gifted myself as the result of this challenge: I will not feel guilty if the list isn't totally completed this year–if it were completed there would be not ufo's or wip's for next year. And I now see that I am not alone here with this new philosophy.
I have been sorting through my scraps for a couple of days now. It's a chore for sure! But I am determined not to buy any fabric this year unless I really, really need to! 🙂 I have a couple of Bonnie's books and hopefully it will give me some inspiration because I do love a scrappy quilt!
3 1/2″ strips (at least 6″) are good for making hourglass blocks when you put two right sides together[cut sets of 2]. they make 6 1/2″ unfinished blocks.
Bonnie's current leader and ender challenge.
okay as an official "Scrap Head" I can say I am doing 5 scrap quilts this year.
I'm working on Bonnie Hunter's Mystery Quilt but I didn't have the colors so had to purchase it. 🙁 However, I do plan on finishing the scrappy mystery from guild and I definitely need to tame the scraps!
What a FABULOUS idea! I think I'll follow your lead and work on getting my HUGE scrap stash under some semblance of control. I will be following your progress and referring my blog readers to your scrappy blog posts.
I would love to see how you do your scrap organization and storage. Mine is still getting the best of me!! Please please please.
Thanks for the ideas! I am going to start with the log cabin scrap quilt, because that is my favorite.
I have been working on a scrappy quilt and bonnies mystery quilt. I have about three scrappy patterns lined up to work my way through as leaders and enders projects. I love seeing how people organise their stash – I've also implemented Bonnies system recently.
enjoy reading about how you sort & cut your fabric.. This may seem so basic but wondering how many colors do you break it down into? Do you separate out holiday & baby prints? What size totes do you use? Do you find totes easier than plastic drawers?
Can't wait to start some scrappy quilts!
I bought 2 major heavy duty shelving units for my fabric in bins. They will hold 5,000 lbs each. Most people who do not sew,do not realize how heavy fabric really is.
I have 9 big bins/totes to sort through. I am a fabric hoarder for sure. Although I am somewhat organized I feel I need to get rid of a lot and or use them up.
I am currently finishing a moose quilt from KeepSake quilting I've had for 2 years. When I am done I will finish my 3 quilt tops for one of our Indian Tribes here in Maine.
Then I hope to finish the 5 baby/crib size rag quilts I have all cut out. Also for our Indian Tribe. I think I will get hubby to help on those.
Daughter has offered to help with sorting all my fabric and transferring them to clear bins so I can see the fabric. They will be labeled so we both can see what is in them.
Seeing as I am starting my last semester in collage in a couple of weeks I need to get myself in motion. Today seems like a good day to start. At least put the shelves together.
Although I am 74 I still like to learn. Your never too old to learn.
But I am anxious to finish this 3 year course. Taking a year off to catch up with everything here before I think about what's next on the learning curve.
So that's about it for now. Unless any life interruptions happen I think I can accomplish much this year, at least I hope so.
I love that you are 74 and still loving to learn. I think that quilting is one of the best ways to forever have a new learning challenge in process. Well, right after tackling college, that is.
I'm currently working on UFOs again this year. Finished a quilt yesterday and finished another quilt top today. Hoping I can keep the momentum going. Partly because there are several new quilt projects that I want to start this year.


text:
Jacob Zuma's incarceration stirs South Africa
by Eylem Parlak December 11, 2021, 9:40 pm 770 Views
Violent protests erupted in South Africa after the arrest of former President Jacob Zuma.
Kwa-Zulu Natal State Prime Minister Sihle Zikalala introduced that the demise toll in violence has risen to 32. Many individuals had been injured in the course of the demonstrations.
Quite a few retailers and companies had been looted by the rebels within the nation's KwaZulu Natal and Gauteng states.
MIDDLE BATTLEFIELD
750 individuals who had been discovered to be associated to the looting and violence, which had been reported to have brought about materials injury of roughly 70 million {dollars}, had been detained.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, "What we're witnessing proper now are opportunistic felony acts, the place teams solely incite chaos as a canopy for looting and theft." mentioned.
Imprisonment of Jacob Zuma stirs South Africa ViDEO
ALLEGED AGAINST THE MOSQUE
Bridge Metropolis and Gleenwood Village procuring malls had been looted by rebels this morning in Durban, KwaZulu Natal State, within the east of the nation, News24 reported.
It was claimed {that a} mosque was set on hearth within the Mayville area of the town, which can also be dwelling to the Muslim inhabitants. Within the metropolis of Pietermaritzburg, the Brookside procuring middle was set on hearth after being looted.
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LOUDER ATTACK ON THE MALL
The R74 freeway, one of many foremost arteries of KwaZulu Natal, was additionally closed to visitors with barricades arrange by the rebels.
Many retailers, companies and a shopping mall within the Soweto space within the metropolis middle of Johannesburg, South Africa's largest metropolis and monetary middle, had been attacked by looters.
MILITARY PREPARATION FOR INTERVENTION
In an announcement made by the federal government, it was acknowledged that the South African Nationwide Protection Pressure was known as to obligation to assist the safety forces in suppressing the occasions.
Within the assertion, it was famous that 2,500 troopers had been ready to be deployed within the Gauteng and KwaZulu Natal areas.
It's noteworthy that the police within the nation have thus far been inadequate in suppressing the occasions.
CLAIMS ABOUT JACOB ZUMA
South Africawho managed the corporate in 2009-2018 Jacob ZumaIt was claimed that 's private expenditures from the state funds.
It was additionally alleged that Zuma acquired bribes to signal the billion-dollar arms deal between South Africa and the French firm Thales in 1999.
Expenses in opposition to Zuma, first charged with corruption by prosecutors in 2005, have been dropped over time.
Zuma resigned from the presidency in 2018 on account of intense stress from his occasion attributable to corruption allegations.
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Violent protest in South Africa PHOTO GALLERY
15 MONTHS PRISON
Zuma, whose lawsuits proceed on 16 expenses together with corruption, extortion, fraud, tax evasion and cash laundering, was sentenced to fifteen months in jail on June 29 by the Constitutional Courtroom for contempt of courtroom.
Though Zuma resisted this determination of the courtroom, he surrendered to the safety forces on 8 July within the metropolis of Nkandla.
The 79-year-old former President was quarantined for 14 days as a part of coronavirus measures in Estcourt Jail, the place he was transferred.
"MAY FORGET TO ZUMA" SHOWS
In Kwazulu-Natal province, demonstrations started to be held as of July 9, demanding Zuma's pardon.
Professional-Zuma demonstrators set hearth to 33 vans on the N-3 freeway in Kwazulu Natal province.
Within the statements made by President Cyril Ramaphosa and the African Nationwide Congress (ANC), the ruling occasion, the violence was condemned and the rule of regulation was emphasised.
CENTER OF THE SHOWS KWAZULU-NATAL
Kwazulu-Natal province, the middle of the pro-Zuma rebellion, is without doubt one of the nation's main manufacturing and business facilities. Town of Durban, South Africa's gateway to the Indian Ocean, can also be inside the borders of this state.
The nation's largest ethnic group, the Zulu folks, make up the vast majority of the inhabitants of the state of Kwazulu-Natal. Town of Nkandla inside the borders of the state, alternatively, is the hometown of former President Zuma of Zulu origin.
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Zuma, who served because the President of South Africa from 2009-2018, surrendered to the safety forces on 8 July in Nkandla.
#Jacob #Zumas #incarceration #stirs #South #Africa
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I have so many questions about the case in which Sandra Bland was arrested in a small Texas town and died in police custody. These are questions that ought to be easy to answer, questions that I suspect many others may share. Here are just some of my areas of inquiry.
Was Bland simply trying to move out of the way of a police vehicle?
The video shows the officer's car accelerating behind Bland's and passing a sign indicating a speed limit of 20 miles per hour. How fast was the officer closing the distance on Bland before she changed lanes? Was it completely reasonable for her to attempt to move out of his way?
2. The officer, while standing at the closed driver's side door, asks Bland to extinguish her cigarette. As soon as she refuses, he demands that she exit the vehicle. Was the demand to exit because of the refusal? If so, what statute in Texas — or anywhere in America! — stipulates that a citizen can't smoke during a traffic stop?
Encinia's instructions to Bland are a jumble of confusion. After she is handcuffed, he points for her to "come read" the "warning" ticket, then immediately pulls back on her arm, preventing her from moving in the direction that he pointed, now demanding that she "stay right here." He then commands Bland to "stop moving," although, as she points out, "You keep moving me!" What was she supposed to do?
Encinia says, "One thing for sure, it's on video." Only, it isn't. Why exactly was Bland walked out of the frame of view of the dashcam for the arrest procedure?
5. The initial video posted by Texas authorities also has a number of visual glitches — vanishing cars, looping sequences — but no apparent audio glitches.
The director of "Selma," Ava DuVernay, tweeted: "I edit footage for a living. But anyone can see that this official video has been cut. Read/watch. Why?" She included a link to a post pointing out the discrepancies in the video.
6. Texas authorities say that, while in the Waller County jail cell, Bland used a trash bag from a trash can in the cell to hang herself. Is it standard procedure to have trash cans with trash bags in jail cells? Is the can secured to the floor? If not, couldn't it be used by an inmate to hurt herself, or other inmates or jail staff?
"Bland disclosed on a form at the jail that she previously had attempted suicide over that past year, although she also indicated she was not feeling suicidal at the time of her arrest, according to officials who attended the Tuesday meeting with local and state leaders investigating the case." Shouldn't they have known it was a suicide risk?
Why weren't more precautions taken, like, oh, I don't know, removing any suicide risks from the cell?
7. Houston's Channel 2 aired "exclusive video from inside the Waller County jail cell where Sandra Bland was found dead." In the video, a trash can — a very large one — is clearly visible. But, strangely, it appears to have a trash bag in it. If Bland used the trash bag to hang herself, where did the one in the can come from? Did they replace it? Why would the jail staff do that?
8. NBC News' John Yang also toured the cell, and in his video he says that "things are really the same as it was that morning" when officers found Bland's body, including food ("Dinner Untouched" was the language used in title of the video on NBCNews.com) and a Bible on the bed opened to Psalms. (That Bible appears to be closed in the Channel 2 video. Who opened it between the two videos?).
Top, a still from Houston's Channel 2 video shows orange shoes and a closed Bible. Below, a still from an NBC News video, with no shoes and an open Bible.
And what page is the Bible opened to in the NBC video? It is open to Psalm 119 and at the top of the page are verses 109-110: "Though I constantly take my life in my hands, I will not forget your law. The wicked have set a snare for me, but I have not strayed from your precepts." Eerie. Or, convenient.
Also in the Channel 2 video, there are orange shoes on the floor by the bed. In the NBC video, they are gone. Who moved them? Why? Where are they?
Yang says of the trash bag in the can: "Around her neck, they say, was a trash bag, an extra trash bag from this receptacle." So what gives here? "Extra trash bag"? Was there more than one trash bag in the cell or had that one been replaced?
Isn't this an active investigation? Shouldn't that cell be treated like a crime scene? Why are reporters allowed to wander through it? Who all has been in it?
Maybe there are innocent and convincing answers to all these questions, and others. I hope so. People need things to make sense. When there are lapses in logic in what people think would be reasonable explanations, suspicion spreads.


text:
Bassett, D. K. "Changes in the Pattern of Malay Politics, 1629-c. 1655." Journal of Southeast Asian History 10, no. 3 (1969): 429-52.
p. 430. The combined forces of Portuguese Melaka, Johor, and Patani inflicted a crushing defeat against the Acehnese fleet near Melaka in 1629, perhaps a turning point in the rise and fall of Aceh's power in the 17th century.
p. 431. Patani and Johor maintained a reliable alliance in the period 1629-45. Bassett argues that this implies a certain flexibility in contemporary political alignments on the peninsula, which one might not imagine from the restricted loyalties of the colonial period. The author points out that Patani played a role in several matrices of political power. It at once sent bunga emas to Ayutthaya, but also maintained strong personal ties with the ruling families of Johor and Pahang. In 1612, the wife of the Raja of Siak, brother to Sultan Ala'ud-din Ri'ayat Shah II of Johor, was the daughter of the Queen of Patani's younger sister. This did not prevent Johor threatening Pahang in 1612-13, before the Acehnese raid on Batu Sawar. A month after the fall of Batu Sawar, the Sultan of Pahang, with his wife, paid a short visit to the Queen of Patani. After Raja Bujang became Sultan Abdu'l-Jalil III of Johor in 1623, he seems to have made his authority good also in Pahang and may have lived there in comparative safety, while the laksamana restored the government in the Riau-Lingga archipelago. At the time of the war between the three allies and Aceh in 1629, the Queen of Patani was the aunt of the sultan of Johor (Abdu'l-Jalil III). When the Queen of Patani refused to recognize the overlordship of King Prasat T'ong in 1630, she had Johor, Pahang, and the Portuguese as her allies. The Thai fleet, which should have attacked Patani in 1634, turned back when confronted with the fleets of Johor, Pahang, and Portuguese Melaka. The family connections between Johor and Patani continued to strengthen until 1645, when there was a reaction against Johor's influence in Patani.
p. 431-32. Siam may well have used its connections to Patani to extend its influence to Johor after 1636. A Siamese envoy was at Bintang, visiting Abdu'l-Jalil III and the laksamana, in December 1637.
p. 432. Ambassadors from Patani came to Batavia in December 1639 to inform the Dutch governor-general Van Diemen that the Yang-di-Pertuan of Johor had married the Queen of Patani. When envoys from Patani arrived with annual tribute in Ayutthaya in August 1640, they were accompanied by an emissary from Abdu'l-Jalil III, also bringing a letter and a present to the king of Siam.
p. 432, 434, 438. The Acehnese overran Johor in November 1639, causing Abdu'l-Jalil III of Johor to flee to Patani, where he remained in 1639-41, returning to a new capital on the Johor river opposite Batu Sawar only after the laksamana ensured Dutch protection against Aceh by assisting them in taking Melaka from the Portuguese. Indeed, the Acehnese forces of Iskandar Thani, when in Pahang, feared an attack from Johor, Patani, and the Portuguese, which caused him to appeal for Dutch support against the three countries. However, the Dutch saw the strong Acehnese presence on the peninsula as a threat to their eventual base at Melaka and thus convinced Johor's ruler to return with the allowance that Pahang be returned to Aceh (in whose hands it had been in previous years).
p. 445. A palace revolution against Abdu'l-Jalil III's brother in Patani in 1645 caused the sultan of Johor to consider sending a fleet expedition to that country in the same year. At that time, the Dutch considered intercepting and destroying the fleet, but eventually decided against it.
Bonney, R. Kedah 1771-1821: The Search for Security and Independence. East Asian Historical Monographs, ed. Wang Gungwu. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1971.
p. 17. In 1636, as Siam prepared to send another military force against Patani, Kedah negotiated a peace between the two rulers which ultimately resulted in Patani again sending the bunga emas dan perak to Ayutthaya.
Charney, Michael W. Southeast Asian Warfare, 1300-1900. Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section Three: South-East Asia, v. 16, eds. V. Lieberman, et al. Leiden: Brill, 2004.
p. 77. The queen determined to lift the siege against Patani by attacking the army, a tactic which proved successful given the already rife starvation in enemy ranks.
p. 91. Patani's palace had a moat for defense against attacks which caused the eastern wall of its inner stockades to be narrower than the others because of the proximity of the moat itself.
p. 196. Many Siamese starved during the invasion in 1634 because ships were not able to transport much-needed provisions to the army and they had to survive on what they had brought with them.
Cummings, W. "The Melaka Malay Diaspora in Makassar, c. 1500-1669." Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 71, no. 1 (1998): 106-21.
p. 114. The diasporic Malay community in Makassar evolved from a rather insular community to intimate and important allies of the Makassarese ruling class in the 17th century. The beginning of this change began in Patani. There, internal turmoil led to the departure of a number of nobles from Patani who came to Makassar and changed the nature of the community there. There are four surviving stories (two Makassarese and two Malay) that tell of the voyage from Patani to Makassar that would serve to dramatically change the Malay community there. Apparently the nobleman Datu' Maharajalela quarreled with the ruler of Patani and eventually left the city, taking with him his niece Tuang Aminah and her husband Tuang Rajab, the son of the Minangkabau ruler of Pagarruyung, Datu' Makotta. These important figures went onto become leaders in the Malay community in Makassar.
Hall, D. G. E. A History of South-East Asia. 4th ed. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1981.
p. 339. In the 1630s, the Dutch sent ships to assist the Siamese king Pasat T'ong against the Cambodians and the Portuguese on the one hand and rebellious Patani on the other.
p. 372. In what may have been a period of alliance-building, Johor, in the wake of the decline of Aceh and the Dutch take-over of Melaka, had his younger brother marry the queen of Patani in 1644. Fear of the Dutch also made Aceh and Jambi his allies.
p. 384. The queen of Patani refused to recognize the new king Prasat T'ong, whom she described as a "rascal, murderer, and traitor." In 1632 and again in 1634, the royal army failed badly in attacks on Patani, during which they expected Dutch assistance. In the first case, the Dutch sent no aid, in the second, their assistance arrived too late. In 1636, a reconciliation was reached between Patani and Siam through Dutch mediation.
Manguin, Pierre-Yves. "The Vanishing Jong: Insular Southeast Asian Fleets in Trade and War (Fifteenth to Seventeenth Centuries)," in Southeast Asia in the Early Modern Era: Trade, Power, and Belief, ed. Anthony Reid. Asia East by South. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993: 197-213.
p. 212. The Patani fleet sent against Aceh in 1626 is said to have had 100 ships and 9,000 men.
Reid, Anthony. Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce. Volume 1: The Lands below the Winds. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988.
p. 171. Reid speculates that Patani, after experimenting with female rule, decided to institutionalize it mainly because they found it better for trade and such rule was generally more businesslike. Theft was severely punished by the queens and property rights were respected, unlike under the last king, who had been quite tyrannical and who had exacted great duties at the port which had restricted trade greatly. The queens were not mere figureheads, however, and engaged actively in trade, so much, in fact, that the fourth queen lowered port duties because she was independently wealthy due to a sizeable inheritance and from her own involvement in mercantile activity. It was women's business to understand market forces, to drive hard bargains, and to conserve their capital. The system only failed when Patani (and Aceh) ran out of credible candidates and the orangkaya lost power and influence to others less interested in trade.
Reid, Anthony. Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce. Volume 2: Expansion and Crisis. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993.
p. 71, 73. Patani's population in 1602 is estimated at 20,000 based upon the observation by a Dutch merchant that 4-5000 people marched in a procession at that time. Reid placed Patani in the third tier of Southeast Asian markets. In the first group, he placed Thang-long, Ayutthaya, and Mataram with estimated populations of 150-200,000 inhabitants. In the second tier, he situated Aceh, Makassar, Banten, and Kim-long (Cochin China), each of which may have peaked around 100,000 people. The third tier included Mrauk-u (the Arakan capital), Patani, Vientiane, and Pnompenh, which peaked around 20-50,000 people.
p. 125. Even as late as 1634, during the conflict between Ayutthaya and Patani, the former did not possess adequate seafaring knowledge, nor a fleet to attack Patani from the sea; this is noted in the Hikayat Patani.
p. 129. Another diasporic Patani notable – Entji Amat – was the first leader of the Malay community in Dutch Batavia and served the VOC as writer, translator, diplomat, and protocol officer.
p. 265-66. Reid analyzes the benefits and drawbacks of the rule of queens in Patani. On the one hand, the greater power of the orangkaya in the system allowed for protection of private property to a much greater extent than other states. In effect, the orangkaya ran affairs with the queen as ultimate referee. However, by the time of the third and fourth queens (1624-49), the queen was no longer powerful enough to mediate disputes between leading orangkaya. Furthermore, in times of crisis, when a strong leader was needed, the queen was unable to unite the country against foreign threat. Thirdly, queens were never legitimate rulers in the eyes of Muslims and thus their powerbase was ultimately undermined by successive waves of Islamic thought and practice, more explicitly in Aceh than Patani.
Reid, Anthony. "The Structure of Cities in Southeast Asia, Fifteenth to Seventeenth Centuries." Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 11, no. 2 (1980): 235-50.
p. 238. Reid estimates that Patani had approximately 10,000 fighting men, citing Mandelslo's travel account.
p. 246-46. Most of Patani was burned during a Javanese slave revolt in 1613 which drove elites from their homes.
p. 247. The author argues that the merchant aristocracy, which was the dominant class in these port cities at their period of most vigorous growth, tried to limit the arbitrary power of the ruler. Within this context, he cites the Patani case, where the rule of four successive queens coincided with its greatest commercial success.
Reid, Anthony. "Understanding Melayu (Malay) as a Source of Diverse Modern Identities." Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 32, no. 3 (2001): 295-313.
p. 301. The Dutch identified the Malays among other mobile, maritime groups in the archipelago, such as the Chinese, Bugis, and Javanese. Patani Malays emerged as the leaders of the two great diasporic Malay communities in Makassar and Batavia, thus the second generation of those who participated in the diaspora after the initial dispersal from Melaka.
Scupin, Raymond. "Islam in Thailand before the Bangkok Period." Journal of the Siam Society 68, no. 1 (1980): 55-71.
p. 60. Scupin argues that political relations between Patani and Ayutthaya remained loose until in the 17th century when, with the decline of Portuguese trade, Patani became the principal port for Japanese and Thai traders. From that point onward, political relations became more substantive.
Sutherland, Heather. "The Makassar Malays: Adaptation and Identity, c. 1660-1790," in Contesting Malayness: Malay Identity Across Boundaries, ed. Timothy P. Barnard, 76-106. Singapore: Singapore University Press, 2004.
p. 80. A nobleman from Patani, named Datuk Maharaja Lela, was chosen as chief of the Malays in Makassar in 1632 and helped further strengthen the Malays' position there as major merchants as well as in the court. He was a prominent supporter of the sultan, as well, and fought against the Dutch until their capture of the city in 1669. After this, he fled and died soon after. He was described in Malay accounts as a "true warrior" and apparently rebuffed Dutch attempts to buy him for their cause numerous times.
Van der Cruysse, Dirk. Siam and the West 1500-1700, tr. Michael Smithies. Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2002.
p. 60. Despite a negative report from the Dutch agent Caen, Joost Schouten arrived in Ayutthaya in May 1633 with Jeremias van Vliet as his deputy to reopen the factory there. He was well received, mainly due to the fact that the new king of Ayutthaya was seeking a military alliance against the rebellious queen of Patani, who had rebelled against Siamese control after the usurpation of the Ayutthayan throne in 1629.
Villiers, John. "Makassar: The Rise and Fall of an East Indonesian Maritime State, 1512-1669," in Southeast Asian Port and Polity: Rise and Demise, eds. J. Kathirithamby-Wells and John Villiers. Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1990a: 143-59.
p. 149. Records show that in the 1590s, Malays demanded exemption from local Makassarese law such as adat and protection from any intrusion into their homes or confiscation of their property by Makassarese officials. "Malays" were defined as people from Pahang, Patani, Kampar, Minangkabau, and Johor.
Vlekke, Bernard H. M. Nusantara: A History of the East-Indian Archipelago. European Business: Four Centuries of Foreign Expansion, ed. Mira Wilkins. New York: Arno Press, 1977.
p. 109. Aceh was very close to taking complete control of the straits and the lands on either side (Malay Peninsula and Sumatra), but this was only prevented by an alliance of "small powers" in the area: Portuguese Melaka, Johor, and Patani. Together the allied fleets crushed Acehnese power in a great naval battle near Melaka in 1629.
Wood, W. A. R. A History of Siam: From the Earliest Times to the Year A.D. 1781, with a Supplement Dealing with More Recent Events. London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1926.
p. 176-77. The queen of Patani, just like the shogun of Japan, refused to recognize Prasartthong as the new king of Ayutthaya in 1629. This, in general, soured relations between Ayutthaya and Japan for some time after this. The queen of Patani described declared herself independent of Ayutthaya, whom she described to a Dutch visitor as a "rascal, murderer and traitor." Cambodia, as the same time, was supposedly waiting for a suitable opportunity to invade Siam with the help of the recently expelled Japanese merchants.
p. 179. An expedition undertaken against Patani in 1632 by Siam was unsuccessful. The Patanese repulsed the Siamese and inflicted several severe defeats upon them. According to Dutch witnesses, this was due to the bungling methods of the Siamese general, but the blame was thrown on the Dutch, who had been expected to assist with two ships, which never turned up. In 1634, a more serious attempt was made to subdue Patani. An army of over 30,000 men was raised at Ayutthaya and was sent under the command of P'ya P'rak'lang to Nakhon Si Thammarat, accompanised by a great many elephants, ponies, guns, and ammunition. There they were to be joined by other troops, sent by sea, and by armies to be raised on the peninsula. The total force available was estimated at between 50,000 and 60,000 men. The Dutch again promised to assist with six large vessels and the few Japanese remaining in Ayutthaya were also ordered to take part in this expedition. Owing to gross mismanagement, this campaign, like the first, was an utter failure. Instead of waiting for the Dutch fleet, the Siamese attacked Patani, and were repulsed with severe losses. Their provisions then ran short, and they returned to Singora. The Dutch fleet, on reaching Patani, found that the Siamese had departed.
p. 180. In 1636, extensive preparations were made to subdue Patani, but an embassy was first sent to urge the queen to submit. By the advice of the Dutch, the embassy was well-received, and the Patanese envoys were sent in April to Ayutthaya to beg forgiveness, and to present the usual tribute of gold and silver flowers.
Wyatt, David K. Thailand: A Short History. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982.
p. 110. Patani rebelled against the usurper Prasartthong and attacked Phattalung and Nakhon Si Thammarat in 1630. Soon, Songkla was also at war with Patani. Through this, Patani appears to have been in an alliance with the Portuguese, whereas Ayutthaya seems to have generally allied itself with the Dutch. A small Dutch fleet sent to assist an Ayutthayan army against Patani in mid-1634 arrived too late to save the Siamese from defeat.


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Opinion & Features
Swindon charity wins Queens Award for Voluntary Service
By Ben Fitzgerald - 2 June 2020
CommunityCharityVolunteering
The Harbour Project for Swindon Refugees and Asylum Seekers receives the Queen's Award for Voluntary Service (QAVS).
This group based in Swindon have been honoured with a QAVS, the highest award a voluntary group can receive in the UK.
HM The Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire, Mrs Sarah Troughton was delighted to learn that The Harbour Project had been awarded the prestigious QAVS.
Mrs Troughton stated: "I am so pleased when groups are recognised for the unique services they provide to their communities. The Harbour Project and their volunteers have done so much to ensure that Refugees and Asylum Seekers feel welcomed and supported in Swindon and the Award is justly deserved.
"My thanks go to the staff, the volunteers and of course the clients for their resilience, good humour and forbearance at this difficult time as we all deal with the Covid-19 pandemic".
Cllr Cathy Martyn, Swindon Borough Council's Cabinet Member for Safer Communities, said: "This is fantastic news. Congratulations to the Harbour Project for this award. They play a vital role in Swindon and they are one of the Council's key voluntary sector partners.
"I visited the Harbour Project at the end of last year. I met some of the staff and volunteers there and I saw for myself the amazing support they offer to some of the most vulnerable people in our community. I hope they are able to continue this for many years to come."
Representatives of the Harbour Project will receive their QAVS crystal award from the Lord Lieutenant in the summer/autumn.
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Most accidents come from a lack of understanding of regulations or because of shortcuts being taken by those who show little respect for the dangers that face them when they come in contact with hazardous materials. Other situations arise when you unknowingly handle hazardous materials because your team fails to understand the risk or they have been improperly declared as Dangerous Goods. We can help you learn a lesson about dangerous goods instead of having dangerous goods teach you a lesson. DGM has a wide-ranging catalog of classes. Most classes we offer can be taken online, on-demand or in the classroom. DGM also offers classroom training in multiple languages, upon request.
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Is it weird that I hear Violins whenever you're gone?
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The Fairley Archive
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About Peter Fairley
About our Fine Art Prints
Talks & Seminars
Though it had been Kennedy which had committed the USA to landing a man on the moon, it befell newly-elected President Richard Nixon to herald the heroes in their achievements. His famed telephone conversation with astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin as they stood beside the US flag on the lunar surface caught NASA by surprise, so they simply patched the US leader through to the explorers via their internal comms systems. Nixon was there to welcome the astronauts home, too, albeit through the window of their new home for a week after splashdown in the Pacific, a mobile quarantine facility aboard the aircraft carrier the USS Hornet.
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Space-suit engineer Dava Newman, SM '89, PhD '92, heads to Washington, D.C., as NASA's deputy administrator.
Establishing a human colony on Mars will require exceptional qualities in an explorer, not least of which are ingenuity, a collaborative spirit, and the iron will of a true pioneer. But it will also require a good suit.
MIT's Dava Newman says colonists will have to be "extreme athlete explorers"—always ready to hop on a rover, climb down a crevasse, or comb through a crater for potential resources. And such physical tasks would be extremely difficult to carry out while wearing traditional heavy, puffy space suits. Today's suits, which use gas to create the pressure needed in zero gravity, haven't evolved much since Buzz Aldrin, ScD '63, and Neil Armstrong made their legendary moonwalk.
For the last 15 years, Newman has sought to reinvent the space suit to make it more form-fitting, flexible, and responsive (imagine superhero garb, without the capes). Her lab is engineering several next-generation suits, including the one she's modeling above: a skintight garment lined with coils of shape-memory alloys that contract to create a pressurized effect in space. She hopes such streamlined suits would give future colonists—whom she sees as similar to the pioneers of the American West—the support and flexibility to actively explore the Martian environment.
Aboard NASA's zero-gravity aircraft in 2007, Dava Newman takes part in a Man Vehicle Lab experiment to quantify astronaut push-off and landing loads. The goal was to measure how astronauts adapt to weightlessness.
For the next year and a half, Newman's space-suit research will continue through her former students as she takes a leave of absence from MIT; last fall, President Obama nominated her to be NASA's deputy administrator, the agency's second in command. In April, the Senate unanimously confirmed her appointment.
"Spending a couple years of my life very focused on positively impacting the future of space exploration—what a great opportunity," says Newman, who will oversee NASA's international partnerships, including the collaboration managing the International Space Station. Newman hopes to significantly contribute to technology, innovation, and education to inspire future aerospace engineers. The agency's long-term strategic plan, she says, includes sending humans to Mars.
Klaus, who was a finalist as a NASA astronaut candidate and has been instrumental in sending dozens of experiments on the shuttle and the International Space Station, says Newman is more than up to the job. "I am confident that Dava will bring her detailed technical knowledge of human space systems, a strong background in policy, and perhaps most importantly, a true passion and enthusiasm for space exploration to the agency," he says.
Newman's interest in space exploration crystallized while she was an undergraduate at the University of Notre Dame in the 1980s, when President Ronald Reagan put forth the Strategic Defense Initiative—a proposal for a space-based missile-defense system intended to guard against a potential Soviet attack. The idea, which would come to be known as "Star Wars," was a provocative one for Newman, who at the time was taking courses in both aerospace engineering and philosophy.
Writing about space policy motivated Newman to pursue human spaceflight as a research path. At Notre Dame, she was one of two women in her graduating class to receive a degree in aerospace engineering. After graduation and a brief stint at Boeing, she landed at MIT, where she went on to earn two simultaneous master's degrees (one in aeronautics and astronautics, the other in technology and policy) and a PhD in aerospace biomedical engineering.
In 1993, Newman joined the aero-astro faculty, where she has since led studies to quantify human performance in space. One experiment measured astronauts' physical and mental performance on the space shuttle. Another examined astronauts' movement strategies in microgravity aboard the Russian Mir space station. Working with Russian astronauts and engineers for two years was a lesson in cross-border communication.
Newman, who is also a faculty member in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology and a Margaret MacVicar Faculty Fellow, encourages just that sort of engineer-to-engineer collaboration across borders as director of MIT's Portugal Program. And for more than a decade, she has served as director of MIT's Technology and Policy Program, which educates students on society's major technological issues and helps them pursue jobs in government and industry.
In 2002, Newman authored Interactive Aerospace Engineering and Design, a textbook geared toward students who may be interested in aerospace engineering but don't quite know how to pursue it.
Brad Holschuh, a postdoc in MIT's Man Vehicle Laboratory, has helped Newman develop smart textiles and active materials for space suits. He says she often goes out of her way to create opportunities for her students to get to know leaders in the aerospace field. "Thanks to Dava, I've had the chance to dine with Apollo and shuttle astronauts, to appear in documentaries on both the Discovery Channel and the Science Channel promoting space exploration, and to conduct bioastronautics research on a microgravity parabolic flight," he says.
Newman's mentoring extends well beyond the classroom. For the past 11 years, she and her husband, architect Guillermo Trotti, have served as housemasters at MIT's Baker House, a dorm that houses 330 students.
Newman's experience as an athlete helps her relate to many of the students who live in Baker House, which is close to MIT's athletic facilities. She's been a Junior Olympic ski racer, a member of Notre Dame's women's basketball team, and part of the MIT Strong team that ran the Boston Marathon in 2014. Today, she often gathers teams in the dorm for a healthy meal before a big game.
In 2002, she and Trotti embarked on an 18-month round-the-world sailing trip. The couple charted the voyage as a global outreach project, visiting schools in seaside villages to talk with students about space exploration.
For Newman and Trotti, those skills were put to the test on a particularly harrowing leg of their journey. After their visit to Panama and the Galápagos Islands, they set off on one of the longest crossings of the trip, sailing 3,200 miles to the Marquesas, a chain of islands in the middle of the Pacific. Midway through, Newman found she was unable to steer the boat. She soon discovered the reason: nearly all of the vessel's hydraulic fluid had leaked through a crack in some copper tubing.
"We were stuck in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, with 1,000 nautical miles to go, so we had to get a fix for the boat to kind of limp in, and then get the proper fix," she recalls.
To deal with the leak, the couple first needed to replace the lost hydraulic fluid with a liquid of similar viscosity. By a stroke of good fortune, Newman had purchased four liters of olive oil before leaving Panama. As it turned out, the cooking oil was just the right thickness to serve as a stand-in for hydraulic fluid. To repair the crack in the copper tubing, they fitted a rubber hose around it, clamped it down, and used a Tupperware container to collect any leaks. Then they rigged a system of tubes, similar to an IV, to feed the leaked mixture of olive oil and hydraulic fluid back into the tank.
As NASA's new deputy, she will be well served by that knack for problem-solving under pressure.
Jennifer Chu covers mechanical engineering, mathematics, physics, aeronautics, astronautics, and earth, atmospheric, and planetary sciences as a writer for the MIT News Office.
Computing pioneer Jay Forrester, SM '45, developed magnetic-core memory. Then he founded the field of system dynamics. Those are just two of his varied pursuits.
Media Lab researchers explore very different applications of finger-mounted input devices.
Keystroke data could lead to earlier Parkinson's diagnoses.


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For most retail automotive professionals, and unless technology is one of your outside interests, it is very hard to keep up with all the changes that come your way.
The newest and greatest new gadget may, or may not, be worth your attention or concern. Worse yet it may, or may not, be worth your investment.
Visit with automotive technology expert Erik Nachbahr as he cuts through the fog and lets you know what you should consider and what you should ignore at least for now.


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Meet the woman forced to demolish her house built without planning permission in Cornwall
Sue Wilesmith estimates she has lost up to £150,000 after she was ordered to demolish her newly built house
A woman has been forced to demolish a new house which was built without planning permission.
The two-storey timber property at Terras Crossing near Looe has been completely taken to pieces.
Owner Sue Wilesmith, 63, estimates that she has lost around £150,000 in costs, not counting the £200,000 cost of the land.
She bought the land off the A374 in 2012, which included two derelict buildings one of which was a former lock-keeper's cottage.
She said: "People have been shocked to see that it's been taken down. We just assumed we could renovate and refurbish the buildings."
Inside Cornwall's first ever Adult-Only Inflatable Theme Park at Falmouth
Sue said that once she had bought the land, it soon became clear that the cottage would have to be rebuilt. Crucially though, she did not apply for planning permission to Cornwall Council.
Sue Wilesmith, beside the range at the heart of what was once her house (Image: Tom Last)
"It looked like it had rendered walls, but I soon realised that beneath the plaster, the walls were only held together by chicken wire and corrugated iron," she added. "The only thing holding up the roof was a single beam. It was like a game of Jenga.
The house before it was demolished
"I didn't really consider planning permission. I was more concerned with the structure."
Shock for lorry driver caught tailgating unmarked police car on A38 near Plymouth
She said she decided to rebuild the cottage with a new timber building which would be one metre taller than the original.
But when it was finished, the council were notified and began enforcement action against the property.
The footprint of what was the house, beside the railway at Terras Crossing (Image: Tom Last)
"I applied for a certificate of lawful use but that was rejected," added Sue. "Then I applied for retrospective planning permission but they weren't having any of that.
"I just couldn't get anyone to sit down and have a conversation with me. I don't feel hard done by, but I do feel, if you read anything about how a planning department should behave, I think they were a bit harsh not having a conversation with me about coming to some arrangement."
The remains of the building at Terras Crossing (Image: Tom Last)
Massive housing block for 528 students approved for industrial estate at Penryn
Admitting her mistake in not getting permission, she said: "As much as it was a beautiful building, and it was lovely inside, I can actually see their point of view. I did however think the building was in keeping with the area, being made of timber and as a lodge among the trees.
What was the garage at Terras Crossing (Image: Tom Last)
"I do agree the building looked too tall and, looking at it now, I'd like to be able to put a single-storey building there."
This hidden quarry is Cornwall's coolest new place to stay
However, after losing a court case, Sue was fined £6,500 and ordered to remove the house and two points of vehicular access to the plot, which she claims were already in existence. She said she would contest the issue about access.
She said she only rented out the property in the summer as a way of recouping some of her losses.


I had a response from Gavin Mannion where he stated, "I hope you know that I don't care what you think the law is, sources are private so deal with it." in response to my statement " "I hope that he knows that since his blog is not a registered newspaper that he cannot provide any protection to his sources."
I can now see why Webster asked him to get legal advice.
Sources for a blog are never private. I cannot believe that one man thinks that he is now above the law.
In fact, Mannion seems to make all sorts of accusations in his blog. If they were true, why does he not list the sources and why does he not take action.
His statement shows that even though he does not much like me, and he mentions me as the problem, yet he WANTS me to take over as it will give him articles.
Is this not corrupt behaviour? Is it not corrupt to make a living off what you see as wrong? I think that it may well be.
Mannion too states that the system is corrupt.
Oh, I get it, he would prefer to be seen as the 'community's voice' where he sees and knows all... Surely if he was concerned, he would be advocating people to stand for the positions offered to right the wrongs, not hoping to see it fail.
In my opinion Mannion does not truly have any gamer's interests at heart.
Round 5, really, who knew?
So Mr Mannion, you seem to think that you have picked a fight with the MSSA.
Certainly your one headline titled "Quick MSSA Update–Round 5" seems to imply that you are in a fight.
I wonder if anyone has bothered to tell the MSSA?
The reason I say this is because no matter how hard I have searched the internet, I have not found any scathing or vindictive response by the MSSA.
I too looked at what Mr Mannion calls 'legal action'.
Well I hate to disappoint, but it does not even state the intention to start any litigation.
I see that Mr Mannon also claims to have a whole lot of information. I hope that he knows that since his blog is not a registered newspaper that he cannot provide any protection to his sources.
But, this is why I have advocated for years that Colin Webster should no longer be President of the MSSA.
For years he has pursued a concilliatory approach to people who have opposed the very existence of the MSSA for their own ulterior motives.
Webster has openly stated that he would not use the law to enforce the MSSA's rights as being the sole authority in charge of eSports in South Africa. He has openly stated that he would continue to work to get all gamers to see the 'strength' and 'purpose' of the MSSA and get them to cross the 'divide'.
For all of Webster's efforts, those who were entrenched in their beliefs still are.
Nothing is going to change those who can not, will not, and dare not, change.
That is why I, for one is ecstatic that this is the last year of Webster's presidency.
It allows the way for the committee to become more representative. This in turn will unlock more finances from government. A truly representative association will also mean that the MSSA will become more aggressive in terms of pushing a number of development programmes as well as allow the MSSA to build up a war-chest to deal with those who do not see the political realities.
There also need to be several changes to the committee. The current rules that stop any one member from dominating the committee has to go.
Webster has continually fought to make sure that the committee did not form cliques, but it is only through cliques that you can have effective management.
That is why I will become a candidate in December.
There will be real change in December, and I will be there!
"On Thursday, 12 September 2013 the MSSA officially handed Protea Colours over to Nathan 'StatiC' Anderson at the Old Edwardian Society in Lower Houghton.
The sponsorship received from MWEB was fully explained to all present. It was noted that if it were not for the sponsorship from MWEB, that Nathan would not have been able to attend DreamHack Bucharest.
It was then explained that with the accreditation of eSports as a full sport in South Africa, the Protea Colours Board is able to award Protea Colours to gamers.
This is the same Protea Colours that are awarded by the Board to South Africa's other sporting stars for sports such as swimming, cricket, rugby etcetera.
After the award ceremony, Nathan was whisked off to the airport where he boarded his flight to Romania.
However Nathan 'StatiC' Anderson, who plays for Veneration eSports on a club level) found the championship to test his mettle. Among the finest players in the world, Nathan held his ground in some pretty intense games. 'Ret' (from the Netherlands) and 'Niroxs' (from Switzerland) proved to be too strong for Nathan and defeated him. However, Nathan fought back courageously to beat the Romanian player 'Shinersen'.
Unfortunately the win was not enough, and Nathan was eliminated from the group stages.
There is no doubt that Nathan learnt some very valuable lessons at DreamHack Bucharest which was played on the 14th and 15th of September 2013. The lessons learnt by Nathan at this event will no doubt put him in good stead for his forays into future competitions."
Prize money in SA gaming is premature!
A number of local organisations give prize money to local competitions.
Most notably of these is the DGL.
However, does this really help gaming?
Let's unpack the issue shall we.
First, the giving of prize money differs from the award of a medal or such as it ceases to be an award, but instead becomes a reward.
In line with the professionalism of the recipients.
If the reward is in excess of the categories mentioned above, then the reward ceases to be a reward, and instead becomes merely an 'entitlement'.
And it certainly seems as though that the way in which prize money is awarded in South African eSports at the moment seems to be that. A very closed affair with the money going to those that 'deserve' it.
And then there is the matter of development.
How does prize money help development of the new gamers, of the elite gamers, and in getting new gamers into the competitive scene?
Getting in new gamers: There is no doubt that large sums of money offered as prizes carry sensationalist headlines. But after the initial hype, it is all an empty promise in my opinion. The prize money may well attract the attention of the reader and the non committed gamer, but it does nothing to enable anybody to actually start gaming. In other words it is purs marketing.... all words and no substance. It does not take the average person more than a few nanoseconds to realise that the prize money is reserved for the few. Thus, the prize money offering is incapable of helping new clans to start, to maintain the sustainability of clans, or indeed, provide for the very basics that a growing sport needs.
Development of new gamers: eSports is like a garden, in order to see real growth, the garden has to be tended, mulch and compost has to be dug in, and the weeds pulled. In other words, development of new gamers is year-long and requires continual attention. Gamers require coaching, training and events in order to improve. But before that, gamers need venues, equipment and support. Prize mney given top the few instead of having at least three times the amount spent on development is thus meaningless. The prize money given never gets distributed down the pyramid to deliver any real sustainability and growth to support the growth of eSports as a true sport.
Development of elite gamers: Of course it is the elite gamers who are the ones in line for the prize money, but does it help them?
Often the prize money offered by an organiser is split up among a number of titles and a number of positions, so, by the time the monies are actually given, the amounts are not enough to help elite gamers achieve their objectives of competing in international competition. In fact, at times, there is sometimes only enough for the team or gamers to cover their own costs to pay for their costs to get to and from the event.
The amounts given, are also nearly nowhere the amounts required for any gamer to become a true professional. It is through being a true professional that gaming in South Africa will truly improve and become on par with gaming overseas.
Instead of companies pouring monies into prize money, more good will be done if the companies take one step back and look at the needs of the gamers.
By not paying prize money, companies could identify to gamers and put them on a payroll and turn them into top professionals.
This is what gaming really needs.
This is what South Africa needs!
I see that the MSSA has been busy of late.
Obviously the sponsorship that the MSSA receives from MWEB is an important factor to their level of activity.
It is interesting that the MWEB Protea Dota 2 team whitewashed the Mexican team on the 7th of September 2013. South Africa's strength as opposed to the Mexicans was totally phenomenal.
Of course there are the critics. They are not happy when South Africa loses, and they are not happy when South Africa wins. They are just never happy!
So that is it.... according to Webster the MWEB Protea Dota 2 Team won fair and square.
However, I have a bone to pick with the MSSA. I have not seen the results for the Online League of Legends Championships.
But it was a busy weekend. The same weekend saw the MSSA holding its 1st Nkangala Regional Championships in Mpumalanga for COD 4. The winners were, not surprisingly, D5g of the All Stars Club.
Of course the highlight of the month for me was the fact that Veneration eSports gamer, Nathan 'StatiC' Anderson is selected to be the newest member of the MWEB Protea Team.
And he is living the dream! Imagine to be sent across to play at DreamHack Bucharest. I would give my left b*** for that.
And to get Protea Colours to boot. What an honour!
Everyone here in Zola is rooting for you.