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Tag Archives: Tione di Trento
Family History, Family Trees, Genealogy Tips, Parish Records, Trentino History, Trentino Names, Trentino Surnames and Soprannomi
6th October 2019 Lynn Serafinn	18 Comments
Genealogist Lynn Serafinn explains the role of the soprannome in Trentino and other parts of Italy and shows how to recognise them in genealogical records.
Sooner or later, anyone working with Italian genealogy will encounter something called a 'soprannome' (plural: soprannomi).
And if you're working specifically on Trentino family history, you might also hear or read the word 'scutum', which is the Trentino dialect word for soprannome.
Despite the fact that EVERY family of Italian origin has a soprannome, many people researching their Trentino (or other Italian) ancestry either don't know anything about them or fail to recognise them when they see them. And of those who DO know something about them, they often misunderstand the meaning and 'behaviour' of their family's soprannome over time.
I've mentioned soprannomi within the context of other articles on this website but have never spoken about them in detail. As this subject is such an important part of Trentino genealogy, I thought it would be helpful to devote an entire article to the subject.
In this article, I will discuss:
What soprannomi are and why they are used
Why I think the word 'nickname' is not an appropriate term for them.
The various ways soprannomi are recorded in parish registers
How soprannomi are 'born', change, and what they might mean
Why soprannomi can be both a blessing and a curse for genealogists
How to record soprannomi in your family tree
Recording Data – The Computer as an Analogy
Think back to the days when you first started using a computer. Imagine you've just created your first Word document. You probably just saved it to the default 'Documents' folder without thinking about it. You might not even have given it a title, just calling it something like 'Document 1.'
But over time, you made lots and lots of Word documents. Perhaps some were business letters. Perhaps others were letters to the family, stories you wrote or genealogy research notes. After a while, it became difficult to find the documents you had written in the past because they weren't labelled clearly, and they were all in one big folder called 'Documents'.
So, what did you do? Well, first of all, you probably started renaming the documents, so you knew what was what. But then, you might also have started creating folders inside the main 'Documents' folder. Perhaps one folder was called 'Business Letters', and another 'My Research', etc.
But soon, you created still MORE documents. For example, perhaps your research diversified, and now you wanted to separate your notes for different branches of the family. So, you started to create subfolders inside the folder called 'My Research'.
By labelling your files clearly and creating a system of folders and subfolders, it became easier for you to identify and find the correct files when you needed them.
In simple terms, we can say that creating a structure is fundamental to being able to identify things and to distinguish one thing from another.
Name, Surname, Soprannome – An Increasing Need for Accuracy
If you think about it, names, surnames and soprannomi serve much the same purpose as the filing system on our computer:
Our personal names are like the documents, in that each document is an individual entity.
Our surnames are like the folders in which our documents are stored, in that they group many individuals into different categories.
And, in the case of Trentino and other Italian ancestry, our soprannomi are like the subfolders within those folders, in that they create sub-groups within the group.
Just as your system for naming files was less complex when you started out using your computer, naming people was also less complex in the past, when the population was smaller, and most people were living in small, rural hamlets or homesteads.
Indeed, in the beginning, people were known mainly by their personal names along with their father's name and/or their village of origin. Thus, in early records (and sometime even after surnames were already in use), you will see things like 'Sebastiano of Sesto', or 'Nicolo' son of Sebastiano of Sesto'.
But just like when you created folders because you had created so many documents you could no longer find what you were looking for, people started using surnames.
The Italian word for surname is 'cognome' (plural = cognomi):
Con = with
Nome = name
When the words are joined together, the 'n' in 'con' is changed to a 'g', which creates the sound 'nya' (like the 'gn' 'lasagne').
Thus, cognome means 'with the name', implying it is a kind of partner to the name.
While some surnames on the Italian peninsula appear in records as early as the 1200s or so, you don't really see them becoming the norm until around the 1400s, and even then, they are often a bit 'fluid' and still in the state of change/clarification.
The 'Black Death' (1346-53) dealt a severe blow to the European population, wiping out an estimated 50% of the population. But gradually, and additional outbreaks of plague notwithstanding, the population not only restored itself, but eventually expanded by the 1600s.
Then, we see a situation where there was a limited number of cognomi within a small community, but lots of sons were being born, all naming their sons after their fathers. Just like your research documents, things started to get confusing. This is when soprannomi became necessary.
Like cognome, the word soprannome is also comprised of two Italian words:
'Sopra' = above or 'on top of'
'Nome' = name
When the words are joined together, the 'n' is doubled.
Thus, together, the term means 'on top of the name'.
What are Soprannomi and Why Are They Used?
As you might have already surmised:
A soprannome is an additional name used that is used to distinguish one branch of a family from others who share the same surname.
I think it is useful to think of a soprannome as a kind of 'bolt on' family surname, an idea that is also consistent with literal meaning of the word ('on top of the name').
Just as creating subfolders can be extremely helping in helping organise and identify individual files on our computer, soprannomi can be extremely useful in identifying the correct people – both during their own lifetimes, and in our family trees – especially when many people seem to have the same name and surname.
And, although I have NOT seen this mentioned in any of my research resources, I would assume that soprannomi might also have been considered useful (if not necessary) tools in helping ensure close bloodlines didn't intermarry. As I mentioned in an earlier article (see link below), marriages between 3rd cousins or closer were only permitted via a special church dispensation.
MORE READING: Kissing Cousins: Marital Dispensations, Consanguinity, Affinity
Why I Think 'Nickname' is a Misleading Term
I have frequently seen the word soprannome translated into English as 'nickname'. However, I believe this is a misleading term, and it doesn't really reflect the true purpose and behaviour of a soprannome.
When we use the term 'nickname' in English, we usually mean:
A shortening/adaptation of a person's personal name (such as 'Charly' for 'Charles' or 'Peggy' for 'Margaret') OR
An individual 'pet name' given to someone reflecting a personal trait or characteristic; alternatively, it may be associated with an achievement or event unique to them. Almost everyone will have had at least one 'pet name' in their lives, if not various ones from parents, schoolmates, spouse, friends, etc., according to their relationship with them.
While a soprannome might share some obvious similarities with one of these criteria, its historical origins might be so obscure that even the families who 'inherited' it may no longer know where it came from or what it means. Moreover, the original significance of the soprannome may have no relevance whatsoever to the family in the present day. This is quite different from what we associate with the term 'nickname', which is usually something intentionally given to someone to create a sense of intimacy and familiarity.
The function of a soprannome is also quite different from a nickname, as its purpose is to identify a specific lineage of people within a larger group, rather than one particular person. Perhaps the English word 'clan' might be a bit closer in meaning, but I don't know enough about clans in other cultures to make a true comparison.
How Soprannomi Are Recorded in Parish Registers (or not!)
After analysing hundreds of thousands of Italian parish records from at least five different provinces, I can conclude:
There is NO consistently used system for recording soprannomi.
Soprannomi appear in all manner of ways in the records, depending on the era, the parish and the individual style of the priest. You can sometimes read decades worth of records in some parishes, and never stumble across a single soprannome. In fact, I have NEVER seen the soprannome for the branch of our Serafini family in any record, despite the fact it has most likely been around since the beginning of the 19th century. I only know the soprannome anecdotally, via my cousins in Trentino.
That said, there are some common practices for recording soprannomi, including:
'Detto' or 'Dicti'
Perhaps the most commonly seen way of recording a soprannome is with the word 'detto' (if the record is in Italian, usually after 1800) or the word 'dicti' (if the record is in Latin, as is almost always the case before 1800). Without going into the grammar too much, these words are derived from the verb 'to say'. You will often see them in documents with the meaning of 'the aforesaid', but in the context of surname/soprannome, they can loosely be translated as 'called' or 'otherwise known as'.
For example, consider this baptismal record from 1705:
Here we see the name of the baptised child is Antonio, and his father is referred to as 'Giovanni, son of Francesco Buschetti, called (dicti) Caserini. In other words, the surname is Buschetti, and the soprannome for that branch of the family is Caserini.
Be aware, however, that these words are FREQUENTLY abbreviated, e.g. 'dto' for detto, or 'dti' for dicti. Here's one example from a 1768 marriage record from Tione di Trento:
Here, we see the groom is referred to as 'Antonio son of the late Francesco Salvaterra called Borella' (i.e. surname Salvaterra, soprannome Borella), and the bride is 'Cattarina, daughter of Giuseppe Salvaterra called Serafin' (i.e. the surname is again Salvaterra, and the soprannome is Serafin or Serafini). In both cases, the soprannome is indicated by the word dicti in its abbreviated from.
'Vulgo'
Recently when I did some research in Valvestino in the province of Brescia (Lombardia), I encountered another method of recording in soprannomi in Latin records, using the word 'vulgo'. This word loosely means 'commonly', but in this context can be translated as 'commonly known as'.
Consider this baptismal record from 1839 (during an era when I would have expected to see the record written in Italian):
Here, the child's father is referred to as 'Giovanni Grandi, vulgo Ecclesia' (the priest had actually omitted the surname at first and inserted it above the line). Thus, the surname is Grandi, and the soprannome is 'Ecclesia'. However, in this particular case, the family's soprannome is actually Chiesa (which means 'church' in English), as the priest has used the Latin word for church (Ecclesia).
Surname Followed by Soprannome
Some priests don't bother to use an indicator such as detto, etc. for the soprannome, preferring simply to write the two names one after the other. Consider this baptismal record from 1760, again from the parish of Tione di Trento:
Here the priest refers to the father of the child as 'Felice, son of Francesco Failoni Battaia'. It is understood from this context that the surname is Failoni, and the soprannome is Battaia – at least we HOPE that is what he means.
I say 'hope' because, in my experience, priests will occasionally REVERSE the surname and soprannome, making it difficult to know which is which. A perfect example is this same document, in the name of the godmother. She is described here as 'Maria, widow of the late Vittorio Seraphin (Serafin or Serafini) Salvaterra'.
Having done a fair amount of research on the families of Tione, I am fairly certain the Vittorio's surname was Salvaterra, and his soprannome was Serafin(i), not the other way around (in fact, we saw an example of this combination in a previous record in this article). I couldn't say that this was definitely the case, however, without future research.
'Equal' sign
Sometimes soprannome is preceded by an 'equal' sign (=). I have seen this system used most frequently in 19th century records. Usually, this sign will be between the surname and the soprannome, but not always. Consider this 1838 death record from the parish of Cavedago in Val di Non:
Here, this 86-year-old deceased man is called 'Tommaso Viola, son of the late Giovanni = Rodar'. In other words, his surname was Viola, and his soprannome was 'Rodar'.
Where Do Soprannomi Come From?
Much like Italian surnames, many (but not all) soprannomi may be derived from:
The personal name of a patriarch or matriarch
A place of origin of either a patriarch or matriarch
An historic profession of the family
A personal characteristic or attribute of a family or individual
Some examples soprannomi I've encountered which mostly likely came from patriarchal personal names include: Stefani (from Stefano), Battianel (from Giovanni Battista), Vigiolot (from Vigilio), Gianon (from Giovanni), Tondon (probably from Antonio), and many others too numerous to count.
Sal Romano of the 'Trentino Heritage' blog told me that one of the soprannome for his Iob family was 'Sicher', which he theorises may have come from the personal name of a man named Sichero (Sicherius in Latin) in the 1670s.
Occasionally, you will see a soprannome that is derived from the name of a female ancestor, especially if the name is not so common. For example, one of my clients' trees had the soprannome 'Massenza' because that was the name of one of the matriarchs for that line back in the 1700s.
Notice how I am expressing different levels of certainty here. That is because, of the above soprannomi, the only one for which I have definitely identified the origin is 'Massenza'. The origins of the others are only hypothetical until research proves (or disproves) the theory.
Some soprannomi indicate a connection with another place somewhere in the ancestral line. My friend and client Gene Pancheri, author of Pancheri: Our Story, told me that one of the Pancheri soprannomi is 'Rumeri', which means 'a person from the village of Rumo'. He traced the origins of that soprannome to one of the female ancestors (who married a Pancheri of Romallo) who had come from Rumo.
Similarly, my own Serafini branch has the soprannome 'Cenighi' because my 4X great-grandmother, Margherita Giuliani (married to a Serafini in Santa Croce parish), came from the frazione of Ceniga in the parish of Drò (near Arco).
When making a tree for a client last year whose ancestors came from Tione di Trento, I noticed one of the soprannomi for the surname Salvaterra was 'Ragol'. While I haven't yet traced it back to its source, it is highly likely to have originated with female who came from the nearby village of Ragoli, which was often included within the parish of Tione in the past.
Notice how all of the examples above are linked to matriarchal lines. In my observation, most soprannomi that are linked to a place of origin tend to come from a female line. This is because women tended to move to the village/parish of their husbands (unless the woman was wealthy or had inherited property from her father).
There are exceptions, of course. On a list I recently received for Villa Banale in Val Giudicarie via Daniel Caliari at Giudicarie Storia, one of the soprannome for the surname Flaim was 'Nonesi', which means, 'from Val di Non'. I found this interesting because Flaim is not indigenous to Villa Banale, and ALL the Flaim from that parish are descended from one man (named Bartolomeo Flaim) who came from Revò in Val di Non, who migrated there in the 1700s. Thus, all the Flaim there are technically 'Nonesi'; it made me wonder how they figured out which branch got to 'keep' this soprannome as a memory of their origins.
Family Profession
Most soprannomi I have found that relate back to profession will refer to a 'family' profession rather than one for an individual. In this regard, the many variants on the word for 'blacksmith' spring to mind: Ferrari, Frerotti, Frieri, Fabro, Fabroferrari, etc. While most of these are also surnames in their own right, you will also see them crop up as soprannomi, telling you that, at least at some point in your family's history, the blacksmithing was the family occupation.
Perhaps one of the most curious soprannomi I have ever encountered was when I was researching the Etro family of the Bassano del Grappa area of the province of Vicenza (Veneto), who migrated to the mountains of Madonna di Campiglio near Pinzolo in Trentino in the 1860s.
Their soprannome was 'Rollo dei Mori', which means 'Rollo of the Moors'. In this era, the term 'Moor' referred to dark-skinned people from the Iberian Peninsula who were of north African descent, and usually Muslim.
It his book Guida ai Cognomi del Trentino, Aldo Bertoluzza stressed that the surnames/soprannomi derived from this word were most likely used to describe someone with black hair or very dark complexion, NOT someone who had Moorish background.
Bearing that in mind, there was something about the Etro family that MIGHT explain this curious soprannome: THEY WERE CHARCOAL MAKERS (carbonai).
Charcoal making was a 'whole family' operation, requiring the family to spend many months of the year in the woods, away from their main village. Children learned the skills of the profession from a young age, and sons often followed in their fathers' footsteps, also becoming carbonai when they grew up.
In my mind, I imagine the family would often have been seen with blackened hands and faces as a result of their occupation. Perhaps 'Rollo dei Mori' was an affectionate or teasing term given to (or adopted by) the family because they were charcoal makers.
Of course, this is JUST my own theory.
SIDE NOTE: Interestingly, Moorish themes and motifs were very popular in Trentino, and indeed throughout Italy between the 17th and 19th centuries. Consider this amazing 'Moorish' chandelier in Castel Stenico in Val Giudicarie. I've seen many such artefacts in many places in the province. It also brings to mind the 'Dance of the Moors' in Verdi's opera Aida.
Character or Attribute of Family or Individual
Recently I stumbled across the soprannome 'Piccolo Vigiloti', which suddenly cropped up after several generations of seeing 'Vigilot'. This is an example of a patriarchal soprannome differentiating to reflect an attribute of either a branch of the family or an individual. We can safely assume that the 'Vigiloti' branch got too big for the soprannome to be useful, and rather than create a new soprannome, they called one of them 'Piccolo', meaning 'small'. As this branch was not the main focus of my research at that time, I didn't trace it back to its roots, but my guess would be it either means 'the smaller branch of descendants of Vigilio', or 'the descendants of the YOUNGER Vigilio' (which I think is more likely).
Another soprannome I encountered that might be connected to a personal attribute (although, again, I haven't yet excluded other possibilities) is Papi, which I have seen in connection with the surname Rigotti in San Lorenzo in Banale in the 19th century. The word 'papi' is the plural of the word for 'pope' (papa), not to be confused with the word papà, which means 'father'. Both Papa and Papi are surnames in other parts of the province, but the soprannome MIGHT have no connection with these. Rather, as Aldo Bertoluzza theorises in Guida ai Cognomi del Trentino, it might have been used as a nickname for a man (again, perhaps in an affectionate way) who was said to have the demeanour or 'presence' of a pope.
There are a lot of 'mights' here, of course, and I prefer NOT to speculate too much, lest it blind me to the truth later. I think soprannomi that are derived from attributes are often the most difficult to identify with confidence, as we have no way of knowing much, if anything, about the personality of the people or families in question.
Soprannomi Taken from the Surname of a Matriarch
I've put this topic under its own header because I didn't want it to get lost amongst the other categories.
Some soprannomi are actually other SURNAMES. Some examples I've personally encountered include:
Serafini/Serafin (a common surname in Ragoli and Santa Croce) was a soprannome for a branch of the Salvaterra in Tione in the 19th century (as we saw earlier).
Armanini (a common surname in Premione) was a soprannome for a branch of the Scandolari in Tione in the 19th century.
Conti (a surname in many parts of the province, but it also means 'Counts'), was a soprannome for the Pancheri of Romallo in the 20th century.
Bondi (a common surname in Saone, and later in Santa Croce) was is a soprannome for a branch of the Devilli of Cavrasto in the 1600-1700s.
Bleggi (a common surname of Tignerone/Cilla') was a soprannome for a branch of the Duchi in Sesto in the 1500-1600s.
Now, while I cannot say categorically this is true across the board, my 'educated guess' is that most of these surname-derived soprannomi are the surnames of a matriarch in the ancestral line.
In the case of the older lines, I probably will never be able to prove this theory, as the records won't go back far enough to find the origins. Moreover, the further back you go in time, information about women in general becomes increasingly scant.
The fact that some soprannomi are identical to surnames can be a real bother – especially if a priest writes the soprannome before the surname in the record, as you have no way of knowing which is which without cross-referencing lots of other records.
Even worse is when a priest suddenly decides to use the soprannome INSTEAD of the surname, leaving the surname out altogether. That is definitely NOT fun.
When Soprannomi Become a Nightmare
On that note, consider this 1708 marriage record, where the groom is clearly identified as Giovanni Battista, son of the late Vigilio Bondi:
As Giovanni Battista is also called Bondi in his 1690 baptismal record, I originally took this at face value, and assumed 'Bondi' was the family surname.
However, for the longest time I couldn't figure out who this Bondi family were or how they connected to the rest of the tree. They just sort of 'popped up' out of nowhere, like time travellers.
Then, and only by a great stroke of fortune where the priest made a correction in the records, I saw another marriage record for the same Giovanni Battista (he had been widowed twice at this point), where the priest had ORIGINALLY written 'Bondi', and then crossed it out and wrote 'Villi' (one of many spelling variants for the surname 'Devilli') above it:
Only then did I realise that the 'Bondi' family and the 'Devilli' family were one and the same – which was really handy, as Giovanni Battista Devilli happened to be my 6X great-grandfather.
Now consider this record of a double marriage in 1583, in which two siblings married two other siblings:
Now, I know many of you will find this challenging to read, so let me just identify the key people:
Benedetto REVERSI (son of the late Antonio) married Lucia BALLINA (daughter of Vincenzo)
Silvestro BALLINA (son of Vincenzo, hence brother of Lucia) married and Maddalena REVERSI (daughter of the late Antonio, hence sister of Benedetto)
In this record, the priest (don Alberto Farina) has apparently recorded the surnames for the couples, without and mention of soprannome.
But now have a look at this baptismal record from 1588, written by a different priest (Nicolo' Arnoldo) of the same parish:
The child's first name is Antonio, and his surname (or so we assume) is underlined in the first sentence. It looks like 'Tacchel', but I have also seen it spelled 'Tachelli' in other records. I also found a record for Antonio's elder sister, 'Margherita Tacchel', born in 1568.
Like the 'Bondi' family, this 'Tacchel/Tachelli' family were kind of floating in space on my tree for the longest time because I just couldn't figure out who they were. But the answer was staring me right in the face (you can probably already guess it, as I've already shown you the document with the answer).
As you can see in Antonio's baptismal record, his parents' names are 'Benedetto' and Lucia', and they lived in Cavaione. Now, remember we are talking about tiny hamlets, especially back in 1588. Only a handful of extended families would have been living in each frazione.
Add to that, the name 'Benedetto' is not a super common. But the combination of Benedetto AND Lucia in Cavaione in the 1580s? What are the chances of there being more than one such couple?
The answer is: none. There was indeed only one couple with those names in that village at that time.
As my tree is pretty large, I ran a few filters in my Family Tree Maker programme to find a 'Benedetto' living in Cavaione in this era and found Benedetto Reversi and Lucia Ballina, whose marriage I had already entered into the tree. What's more, I knew that Benedetto's father's name was Antonio, and it was the usual practice back then to name the first son after the paternal grandfather.
All this made a very strong case for concluding that these were one and the same couple, and that 'Tachel/Tachelli' was a soprannome for this branch of the Reversi family (a surname that is still in use to this day in that parish).
MAIN 'TAKEWAY': If you see a surname that just sort of 'appears' in the records, and no mention is made that the family came from someplace else, consider the possibility that you are looking at a soprannome and that this family may already exist in your tree.
SIDE NOTE: The surname for the 'Ballina' family here eventually become 'Fusari'. But I digress…
The Ever-Changing Nature of Soprannomi
While the linguistic conventions for creating soprannomi might be similar to those for surnames, there is one BIG difference between them:
While surnames tend to stay the more or less the same for a long time (often for centuries), soprannomi will CHANGE whenever they need to, sometimes from one generation to the next.
Whenever a branch of a family gets very large, with lots of male descendants carrying the family surname, new soprannomi will suddenly spring up to differentiate these various male lines. This is why you might sometimes see a father with one soprannome, and his son with another.
So, if a relative tells you that your family's soprannome is such-and-such, don't just accept it something 'cast in stone'. It might be so, but then again it might not. It's essential to know WHEN they are talking about. If that person saw that soprannome in a book or in some parish records from the 1600s …well… it is highly unlikely this will be your family soprannome TODAY. Many soprannomi will be used only three or four generations (sometimes less) before they morph into something else.
Remember, it's just like creating subfolders (and sub-subfolders) on your computer. There is no way to keep everything straight without continual, dynamic change to adapt to new situations and needs.
And sometimes, but less frequently, these adaptations may result in a more radical change, where a soprannome will replace the surname altogether. In my father's parish of Santa Croce, for example, the family now known as 'Martinelli' used to be called 'Giumenta' before the 1630s, adopting their soprannome (apparently derived from a patriarch named Martino who was born around 1515) as their surname. Similarly, the present-day surname 'Tosi' in the same parish came from the soprannome of a branch of the noble Crosina family of Balbido.
Unless you are aware of these shifts from soprannome to surname, it can seem like your ancestral family has vanished into dust when you are trying to trace them backwards.
Tracing the Origins of Your Family's Soprannomi
As you can see, origins and behaviour of soprannomi are highly varied, often unclear, and constantly changing. As such, tracing the origin and meaning of a soprannome can range from really obvious to doggedly elusive.
But if we are to have even the slightest chance of understanding them, and to using them as genealogical tools, we must make it a practice to keep a record our family soprannomi whenever we encounter them. They are not just colourful names, but important clues as to our ancestral lines, which can help us identify specific people, places and/or occupations of the past.
If you haven't done so already, I highly recommend that you start keeping a list of soprannomi, taking care to record:
The SURNAMES they are connected to
The VILLAGES in which they appear
The DATES (both the earliest AND the most recent) you have seen them in a record
I keep an ongoing list of soprannomi for my father's parish, mostly from the 1500-1700s. I keep it as a 'general task' in my Family Tree Maker programme, and refer to it frequently. For me, those years are the most crucial to record, because (as already illustrated) there are so many instances of the priests using soprannomi instead of surnames. Without this 'road map' I could easily get lost.
Recording Soprannomi in Your Family Tree
I believe it is important to record soprannomi in your family tree, not only because they are an important part of your family history, but also because doing so will also help you keep track of your ancestral lines.
So, what is the 'best' way of doing this? I think it ultimately comes down to personal choice. I've used a variety of methods in different trees,all with their own advantages/disadvantages. Below are a few options you might consider.
TIP: Whichever method you choose, BE CONSISTENT. Try to use the same method throughout the same tree. My oldest tree (now around 26,000 people) has a patchwork of styles, which I am gradually trying to standardise.
OPTION 1: Soprannome as a MIDDLE NAME
Sometimes I put soprannomi in ALL CAPS as a middle name just before the surname.
This has the advantage of making things visible for me to find them quickly in the index when using a programme like Family Tree Maker or searching for that person on Ancestry.
However, it can also be confusing, as I also use the same method with middle names that are used as the primary name by which the person was known.
OPTION 2: Using 'Also Known As'
Both Ancestry and Family Tree Maker have an option for 'also known as' (AKA).
This might seem like a good choice for a soprannome, but I feel that is better used for when someone is known by one of their middle names OR an actual NICKNAME as we think of it in English.
OPTION 3: The 'Double-Barrelled' Surname-Soprannome
In some parishes, the surnames are SO repetitive, and the priests CONSISTENTLY used soprannomi in just about every record, I have occasionally opted to HYPHENATED the surname with the soprannome. This was a method I used when making a tree for someone with family from the parish of Tione di Trento, as the soprannome in that parish are almost always see in conjunction with the surname.
The advantage of this method is it immediately organised everyone with the same surname-soprannome combination alphabetically in the person index for the tree, which is actually very useful.
The disadvantage is that, if you don't know a person's soprannome because it wasn't recorded in the record, they might look like they are disconnected from their branch of the family.
OPTION 4: Create a Custom Fact or Event Called 'Soprannome'
Although sites like Ancestry and programmes like Family Tree Maker don't have a 'soprannome' in their default settings, it is possible to create a 'custom fact' (in Family Tree Maker) or 'custom event' (in Ancestry) and label it 'soprannome'.
Personally, I believe this the BEST option, as it makes it absolutely CLEAR that this name is a soprannome and not something else. When using Family Tree Maker, it gives you the additional advantage of being able to create filtered lists or custom reports for specific soprannomi (which can be really informative). Equally important, you can also write NOTES about the soprannome 'fact/event', where you can discuss how it was derived, when it started, where it was recorded, or any other relevant information.
UNBREAKABLE RULE: Record WHERE You Found It
Regardless of which method you choose or devise to record your family's soprannomi, there is one 'unbreakable rule' I strongly advise you include in your research practice:
After the soprannome, make a note of where you found it – preferably the earliest record.
For example, if a soprannome is in Giovanni's baptismal record, put down 'as per Giovanni's baptismal record' or something to that effect.
But what if it's NOT in the baptismal record for Giovanni, but in the baptismal records of two of his children? Then, write 'as per the baptismal records of his children, Antonio and Maria,' etc. This helps you remember that the soprannome MIGHT have started with that generation, and not earlier. Later, if you find an earlier record, change the notation to reflect that.
Please trust me on this point. In the past, I neglected this important 'rule', which resulted in me not being able to identify where the soprannome first entered the tree, which can potentially create some confusion as you move backwards in time.
How NOT to Record Soprannomi (or Nicknames) in Your Tree
Two things you should NEVER (ever!) use in the name field for people in your tree are:
Quotation marks (AKA inverted commas)
Parentheses (AKA brackets)
I've seen these on so many trees on Ancestry, I've lost count. They are especially common in trees where people changed their names after immigration.
SIDE NOTE: While not on the subject of soprannomi, I really want to stress that married surnames should NEVER be part of a woman's name – neither in the name field, and not in the 'also known as. It is already understood that she would possibly have been known by her husband's surname if she lived in the US or UK. Besides, when we are talking about Italian women, many, if not most, retain their maiden names throughout life.
So, let's have a look at what a MESS all these variables can create. I'll use my father's eldest sister as an example (both she and my dad are deceased):
My dad's sister was born Pierina Luigina Serafini,
She was known as Jean Serafinn in America.
She was sometimes called 'Gina' in the family and 'Jeannie' by American friends.
She was married to a man whose surname was Graiff who died young.
Later she remarried a man with the surname Watson (he is also deceased).
Oh, and just for the heck of it, let's go ahead and throw in our family soprannome, 'Cenighi'.
Using the 'quotation mark' and 'parentheses' methods, and inserting her married surnames, my poor aunt's name might end up looking like this:
Pierina Luigia "Gina" (Jean Serafinn) "Jeannie" Serafini "Cenighi" Graiff Watson
Please DON'T do this!!
Not only is this only horribly confusing to as to what her name actually IS, but all those quotation marks and brackets can cause errors in software programmes.
The best policy is to record the person's name AT BIRTH in the name field, and then put alternative names in the 'also known as' field. And, as mentioned, the husbands' surnames stay with the husbands, not the wife.
Thus, here is how my aunt SHOULD be entered into the tree:
NAME: Pierina Luigina Serafini
ALSO KNOWN AS: Jean Serafinn
SOPRANNOME: Cenighi (not in records, but via verbal info from Serafini cousins)
HUSBAND 1: Albino Graiff
HUSBAND 2: Gary Watson
If you really wanted, you could put additional 'also known as' to put her nicknames 'Gina' and 'Jeannie', but I think those are unnecessary, as we already know she was known as 'Jean'.
Also, if you wanted (and if you knew enough information), you could write some notes about the historical origins of the soprannome in the notes for that fact in Family Tree Marker…. something I am again only just starting to integrate into my own trees. Here are some notes I've entered about the Cenighi soprannome:
The soprannome 'Cenighi' originates with Margherita Giuliani, who married Alberto Serafini in 1803, as she came from the frazione of Ceniga in the parish of Drò (near Arco). Their descendants are thus known as the 'Cenighi Serafini'. I have not yet seen this soprannome in any records; rather, I was told the soprannome by Luigina Serafini (daughter of Luigi Paolo Serafini and Gemma Gasperini). Apparently, the family were unaware of the origin of the soprannome prior to my researching the family history.
Thanks so much for taking time to read this article on soprannomi. I do hope you enjoyed it, and found it informative and useful to your research. It's an article I've been wanting to write for some time now. It's a complex topic – in many ways more complex that surnames.
I also hope I have presented a convincing argument AGAINST the word 'nickname' as a translation for the word soprannome. It really doesn't do the term justice, nor does it reflect its important social function. Perhaps we can all agree to stick to using the original word – soprannome.
I would mean so much to me (and you would really help me know if these articles are explaining things clearly enough), if you could take a moment to leave a few comments below, sharing what you found most helpful or interesting about the article, or asking whatever questions I may not have answered.
P.S. My next trip to Trento is coming up in November 2019. My client roster for that trip is already full, but if you would like to book a time to discuss having me do research for you on a future trip in 2020, I invite you to read my 'Genealogy Services' page, and then drop me a line using the Contact form on this site. Then, we can set up a free 30-minute chat to discuss your project.
P.P.S.: As I've had so many other projects lately, I have still not finished the edits for the PDF eBook on DNA tests, which I will be offering for FREE to my blog subscribers. I will send you a link to download it when it is done. Please be patient, as it will take a month or so to edit the articles and put them into the eBook format. If you are not yet subscribed, you can do so using the subscription form at the end of this article below.
https://trentinogenealogy.com/my-tree/
CavedagoCenigafamily treeFamily Tree Makergenealogyhistorymarriage recordsnamesnicknameparish recordsresearchresearch tipsSanta Croce del BleggioSaonesoprannomesoprannomisurnamesTioneTione di TrentoTrentinoTrentino historyVal di NonVal GiudicarieVilla Banale


text:
<?php

namespace AlphaLabs\Bundle\FilterEngineBundle;

use AlphaLabs\Bundle\FilterEngineBundle\DependencyInjection\AlphaLabsFilterEngineExtension;
use AlphaLabs\Bundle\FilterEngineBundle\DependencyInjection\Compiler\FactoryCompilerPass;
use Symfony\Component\DependencyInjection\ContainerBuilder;
use Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\Bundle\Bundle;

class AlphaLabsFilterEngineBundle extends Bundle
{
    /**
     * {@inheritDoc}
     */
    public function getContainerExtension()
    {
        if (null === $this->extension) {
            $this->extension = new AlphaLabsFilterEngineExtension();
        }

        return $this->extension;
    }

    /**
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     */
    public function build(ContainerBuilder $container)
    {
        parent::build($container);

        $container->addCompilerPass(new FactoryCompilerPass());
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Qatar Teacher's Murderer Sentenced to Death
From Doha News:
After verdict, Patterson family worries justice won't be served
By: SHABINA S. KHATRI | March 30, 2014View as "Clean Read" | 44 COMMENTS
At this time last year, Alison Patterson was celebrating Mother's Day in the UK with two of her three children. Her eldest daughter Lauren was working in Qatar, and sent a gift and a card home, as she always did when she was away.
Today, things are very different for the Patterson family. Daughter Lauren was killed in October by acquaintances in Doha, and on Thursday, a criminal court here found two Qatari men responsible for the 24-year-old teacher's murder.
One of the defendants, 22-year-old Badr Hashim Khamis Abdullah Al-Jabar, was given a death sentence.
The other, 24-year-old Muhammad Abdullah Hassan Abdul Aziz, was handed a three-year jail term for helping Al-Jabar burn Patterson's body, which was considered damaging and erasing evidence.
At the time of the sentencing, Alison Patterson told media that "justice was served" in the case of Al-Jabar, but that she was deeply upset with Abdul Aziz's lighter sentence.
In an interview with Doha Newstoday, Patterson said she is worried that neither of the convicted men will pay for what they did to her daughter.
"Is it something that's just been said – and that's never going to happen?" she asked.
At the root of her doubts is a scene she witnessed after Thursday's verdict inside the courthouse. Patterson had gone in search of her two younger children, and ended up passing a sitting area where the defendants were being held.
"They were just laughing and joking with each other," she said. "It just almost makes me feels that they were laughing at what happened. They have no respect for the sentence they've been given."
Another issue that troubles her is that Qatar has not executed any prisoners in more than a decade, according to Amnesty International.
Prior to her daughter's death, Patterson said she never gave the death penalty much thought. But after being told that Al-Jabar sexually assaulted her daughter, stabbed her to death and then attempted to burn her remains at a farm outside of Doha, she said she supported the punishment.
"Lauren came home in a box the weighed 7 kilos," Patterson said with regards to her daughter's remains. "She weighed 50 kilos when she died."
Patterson has also been unable to shake an argument she read on a recent blog post about her daughter's case on "Muslims Worldwide," which she found while googling Lauren's name.
The site appears to be full of hate speech about Islam and its adherents, but the post on Patterson struck a chord with Lauren's mother because it questioned whether the quick sentencing of Al-Jabar was done so that officials could close the book on this crime, which the prosecutor called "heinous, foreign and shocking to a society as conservative as Qatar's."
The blog post reads:
"Sharia gives no justice to a kafir (non-Muslim/non-believer). And it never gives a death sentence to a Muslim over a crime committed against a non-Muslim…
So why would they announce the 'death penalty' if it is not given out? To appease the media. This case has been circulating all over the world. Arabs can't stand negative media attention…These Arab countries make bogus claims of justice only to get the media off their back. In reality they keep them in prison and release them after 1-2 years."
The last sticking point is that the verdicts must pass through two appellate courts here before they're officially final, meaning closure could be some ways off for Patterson and her family.
Speaking to Doha News, Patterson's partner Kevin Crotty said they were grateful for all the Qatari government has done to ensure a speedy trial.
"They've been more than generous and more than reasonable," he said. "Everything's been done that should have been done. But them (the defendants) smiling – and the lighter sentence for the second one… Ultimately, we've always felt the political angle was there. Is there something that we should worry about?"
The Pattersons' lawyer, Sami Abu Shaikha, has said he plans to appeal Abdul Aziz's three-year sentence, asking for a more severe penalty.
Meanwhile, Alison Patterson, who has started smoking again after 15 years due to the stress of all that's happened, said she knows that whatever the outcome, the pain will likely never go away.
"There will never be peace. (But) I just really don't want to be let down," she said.
April 6, 2014 Posted by intlxpatr | Crime, Cultural, Doha, ExPat Life, Law and Order, Living Conditions, Safety	| 12 Comments

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
The Four Founders and the Magician Card
Submitted by: Erin Dolmage
Searching for Relics with the Tarot as a Guide
By Erin Dolmage
In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling finally unveils Harry's ultimate quest: a search for relics of Tom Riddle's past, which Harry must destroy in order to overcome the evil that is Lord Voldemort. But what are these relics and why does Voldemort covet them? A relic by definition is something cherished for its age or historic interest or an object of religious veneration, especially a piece of the body or a personal item of a saint. Relics were therefore enshrined on altars, carried in processions, and used to obtain cures and other favours.1 Dumbledore recounts that Voldemort "liked to collect trophies, and he preferred objects with a powerful magical history... He would have chosen his objects with some care, favouring objects worthy of the honour." 2 These magical objects would be the most powerful type of vessels, having a magical history from being owned by the most powerful of wizards. Harry and Dumbledore discuss objects that Tom Riddle may have desired to use as Horcruxes, including two objects relating to his questionable family history. These two objects, the Gaunt ring and Voldemort's school diary, join Voldemort's snake Nagini and three objects related to the four founders of Hogwarts, Helga Hufflepuff's Cup, Salazar Slytherin's Locket and something as of yet unknown from Rowena Ravenclaw or Godric Gryffindor. However, as J.K. Rowling is so very gifted at hiding important objects and clues in plain sight, it may be possible to deduce what the unknown objects are by examining a second concept introduced during Harry's investigation into Voldemort's Horcruxes: the Tarot.
In the novels, and most recently in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling has repeatedly referred to the numbers four and seven as both pivotal and symbolic in the Harry Potter series. We have four founders and the houses named for them, four elements that Jo has mentioned relate to the houses: "I wanted them to correspond roughly to the four elements. So Gryffindor is fire, Ravenclaw is air, Hufflepuff is earth, and Slytherin is water, hence the fact that their common room is under the lake. So again, it was this idea of harmony and balance, that you had four necessary components and by integrating them you would make a very strong place. But they remain fragmented, as we know." 3
Why collect relics of each of the four founders? Like the strength behind the alliance of the Hogwarts Four, four of their items together are certainly more powerful as a set than apart. Integral to Tom Riddle's goal of immortality, these objects from the founders strengthen the prestige and powers of his set of six Horcruxes. By choosing relics with a magical history, Voldemort is creating a triple threat: each object has intrinsic powers gained by the item's close relation with a powerful individual. Those powers add to Voldemort's own formidable protection of each Horcrux which is further magnified by the connection to the objects of the Master Magician Hermes pictured in the Tarot. Hepzibah Smith mentions in passing to Tom Riddle that Hufflepuff's cup had "all sorts of powers¦ too, but I haven't tested them thoroughly ¦" 4 Dumbledore later tells Harry that Voldemort on a personal level "felt a great pull towards the school and that he could not resist an object so steeped in Hogwarts history." 5 Tom Riddle indeed felt his tie as the heir of Slytherin, "I in whose veins runs the blood of Salazar Slytherin himself, through my mothers side' 6 made him feel like a kind of royalty, referring to Slytherin's work as "noble." 7 Indeed, as Dumbledore noted, "Four objects from the four founders would, I am sure, have exerted a powerful pull over Voldemort's imagination." 8
From Dumbledore's conversations with Harry we can identify three of the four founders' relics. Hufflepuff's cup, stolen by Tom Riddle from Hepzibah Smith, was described as "a small golden cup with two finely wrought handles" and emblazoned with a badger,9 while Slytherin's locket, owned by the Gaunt family and then sold by Merope, was a "heavy golden locket" marked with an "ornate, serpentine S." 10 Dumbledore also identifies the only relic of Gryffindor's, the ruby encrusted sword that Harry pulled out of the Sorting Hat in his battle with the Basilisk, as safe.11 This leaves only one founder and her accompanying relic to be accounted for: Rowena Ravenclaw.
Now returning to Rowling's assertion that that the four founders and their houses are indeed intended to represent four elements that make a stronger whole, we could apply this assertion to the three objects at hand. But where to identify a pattern of four magical objects that apply to the previously mentioned relics: a cup, a locket, and a sword? Perhaps this pattern can emerge from one magical divination tradition that appears for the first time in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, cartomancy.
Cartomancy is essentially fortune-telling using playing cards, and can be traced back to the first cards printed the middle ages in Italy. The first decks of painted playing cards, The Charles I Pack, and the other called Visconti-Sforza Pack, both appeared in the second half of the fifteenth century.12 The most famous version of these cards is the Rider Waite Tarot, which was produced in the twentieth century. The traditional Tarot deck totals 78 cards, 56 cards in the Minor Arcana and 22 cards in the Major Arcana. In Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Professor Trelawney is found mulling over the meaning of several Minor Arcana cards when Harry encounters her on his way to meet Dumbledore. " ˜Two of spades: conflict,' she murmured, as she passed the place where Harry crouched, hidden. ˜Seven of spades: an ill omen. Ten of spades: violence. Knave of spades: a dark young man, possibly troubled, one who dislikes the questioner --' " 13 Although Trelawney is using what Harry describes as "dirty looking playing cards" and Trelawney refers to the modern suits (spades) we can be assured that she is indeed reading Tarot by her later reference to the Tower card " ˜Again and again, no matter how I lay them out-...-the lightning-struck tower,' she whispered. ˜Calamity. Disaster. Coming nearer all the time...' " 14 The Lightning-Struck Tower, more commonly known simply as The Tower, is one of the foremost cards in the Major Arcana and does not appear in our conventional 52 card deck. The tower symbolizes calamity and the uncovering of a deeply rooted secret, mirroring the events that transpire in its namesake chapter such as Draco's mission and Snape's betrayal and murder of Dumbledore. The placement of the reader's encounter with Trelawney and her cards, which occurs directly before Harry's lessons with Dumbledore, may indeed suggest a connection between the cards and the relics in question.
One other Major Arcana card not mentioned in the novel, but which may give us an insight to a possible pattern to the relics, is the Magician Card in the Major Arcana. The card pictures four objects on a table being wielded by a master magician (the god Hermes or Mercury). The four objects on the table represent the four tools over which the master magician maintains complete control and the power that comes from perfectly manipulating the four magical objects, an image reminiscent of the goals of both the four founders and indeed of Voldemort. Pictured above the head of the magician is the symbol for infinity, the primary goal of Voldemort's Horcruxes and his dark quest for immortality. The four objects in front of the Magician represent the four suits found in the Minor Arcana that we know today as Hearts, Spades, Clubs and Diamonds. They are Cups (Hearts), Swords (Spades), Pentacles/Discs (Diamonds), and Wands or Rods (Clubs).
Figure 1: Tarot card images: I The Magician, XVI The Tower, Knight Of Swords, X Of Swords,
VII Of Swords, II Of Swords.15
If we follow the logic that the relics of the four founders follow the same pattern as the four Tarot suits, it gives us Helga Hufflepuff's Cup, Godric Gryffindor's Sword, and Salazar Slytherin's Locket. This leaves Rowena Ravenclaw's Wand, a logical symbol for the founder of Ravenclaw, "Where those of wit and learning / Will always find their kind." 16 Why a wand? Wands seem to be one of the tools in the wizarding world that are inherently magical, being made of charmed wood with the core of the most powerful magical animals. Harry describes Ollivander's wand shop as a place that tingled with secret magic. Wands have a natural affinity to a specific person "¦(I)t's really the wand that chooses the wizard of course." 17 Not only would a wand owned by any of the four founders be a priceless treasure, but also a wand that had an affinity to the most intelligent of the four founders must have been a powerful item indeed. J.K. Rowling details just how important wands are in the question and answer session during an "Evening With Harry Carrie and Garp" in August 2006:
"I've been asked what would happen if a Muggle picked up a magic wand in my world. And the answer would probably be something accidental ... possibly quite violent. Because a wand, in my world, is merely a vehicle -- a vessel for what lies inside the person.
"There's a very close relationship ' as you know ' between the wand that each wizard uses and themselves. In fact, we'll find out more about that in Book 7. You need the ability to make these things work properly." 18
So, which wand? J.K. Rowling says in her interview with The Leaky Cauldron and Mugglenet just after the release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince that, "I'm prepared to bet you now, that at least before the week is out, at least one of the Horcruxes will have been correctly identified by careful re-readers of the books." 19 Although presumably this is more likely a reference to the locket's final resting place in Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, it does highlight Jo's talent for hiding important clues in plain sight. In Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry describes several seemingly random objects in Borgin and Burkes that are important to the events in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince: the Vanishing Cabinet, the opal necklace, and Draco's Hand of Glory. In Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry notices in Ollivander's shop "A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty window." 20 However, at Harry's birthday dinner in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince we learn that Ollivander is missing, his "Shop's empty. No sign of a struggle. No one knows whether he left voluntarily or was kidnapped" 21 Was the wand maker's disappearance related to Voldemort reclaiming Ravenclaw's wand which was hiding in plain sight in Ollivander's shop? First, we should ascertain if Ollivander's wand shop could have made the wand that Rowena Ravenclaw owned. In a word, yes. Ollivander's sign states it was established in 382 BC22 and Professor Binns informs the class in History of Magic that Hogwarts was founded "over a thousand years ago - the precise date is uncertain" 23 which puts Ollivander's in operation for almost a thousand years before the birth of any of the four founders. With Ollivander's reputation as the finest wand maker in Britain, it is unlikely any of the founders would have gone anywhere else.
However, this thesis of four founders and four items corresponding neatly to the Tarot suits is imperfect. In J.K. Rowling's interview with The Leaky Cauldron and Mugglenet, she explains her elemental associations with the four houses: "I wanted them to correspond roughly to the four elements. So Gryffindor is fire, Ravenclaw is air, Hufflepuff is earth, and Slytherin is water, hence the fact that their common room is under the lake." This however does not correspond to the traditional elemental associations of the four Tarot suits, in which traditionally Wands represent Fire (occasionally Air), Swords represent Air (occasionally fire), Cups represent Water, and Pentacles, Earth. How can we account for this disparity? Jo uses traditional myth to suit her story, playing on mythology and tradition in the context of having parallel worlds, where things that Muggles see as fantasy and magic are actually history of the wizarding world that have crept into the general population's psyche. It's a way of establishing familiarity and acknowledging the parallel traditions that exist in historical and current forms of magic.
Rowling's use of myth and symbols is shorthand in many ways, allowing her to pick and choose patterns and symbols without being tied exclusively to one school of thought. An example is the magical animals in Harry's world that Jo explained in her recent appearance on the Richard and Judy show: "Well, some of the animals I make up, like the Blast-ended Skrewts are mine, but many of them exist in folklore and mythology and I've twisted them a bit to suit my own end. Hippogriffs: there's not a lot if you go looking; I just created my own... you know." 24
Harry's hunt for the remaining Horcruxes will indeed be the focus of the final chapter of the seven book series. According to Harry, "the diary's gone, the ring's gone. The cup, the locket and the snake are still intact and you think there might be a Horcrux that was once Ravenclaw's or Gryffindor's?" 25 These words demonstrate the difficulty of Harry's task in Book Seven. It is not only random objects that Harry needs to find and destroy, but also the most powerful of magical relics. These items that not only contain a fragment of Voldemort's soul and are surrounded by Voldemort's best protections, but are objects that are intrinsically powerful as they carry traces of the awesome magic wielded by the Hogwarts Four. Yet are the identities of the remaining Horcruxes as hidden as one might think? Not if we, like Trelawney, look to the Tarot.
The known relics of the Four Founders follow an intriguing pattern when one looks at the four suits of the Tarot, a form of divination that makes its first appearance in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and accurately predicts the death of Dumbledore on the top of the Astronomy tower. Using the tools found in the Magician card we can ascertain the identities of the relics in question as Gryffindor's Sword, Hufflepuff's cup, and Slytherin's locket that closely follow the suits Swords, Cups and Pentacles of the Tarot. What remains is the Wand suit that points the reader ' and Harry ' to search for missing wandmaker Ollivander and come to the conclusion that that wand in the window is indeed a most priceless relic ' and not just a mouth organ.
1. The New Catholic Dictionary, 1910, s.v. "Relics."
2. Rowling, Half-Blood Prince, 471.
3. Ibid., TLC/MN Interview JKR: Part Three, paragraph 146.
4. Ibid., Half-Blood Prince, 408.
6. Ibid., Chamber of Secrets, 335.
12. Sharman-Burke and Greene, The Mythic Tarot, 7.
13. Rowling, Half-Blood Prince, 185.
15. Waite and Smith, The Rider Waite Tarot: The Magician.
16. Rowling, Philosopher's Stone. 88.
18. Ibid., "An Evening with Harry, Carrie and Garp," paragraph 58.
19. Ibid., TLC/MN Interview JKR: Part Three, paragraph 188.
20. Ibid., Philosopher's Stone, 63.
21. Ibid., Half-Blood Prince, 104.
23. Ibid., Chamber of Secrets, 164.
24. Ibid., "Richard and Judy Show," Part 2, paragraph 121.
The New Catholic Dictionary, 1910. The Catholic Community Forum. http://www.catholic-forum.com/SAINTS/ncd07032.htm. (Accessed August 30, 2006.)
Rowling, J.K. "An Evening with Harry, Carrie and Garp." Radio City Music Hall, August 1, 2006. Transcript, AccioQuote!. Member of the Floo Network. http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2006/0801-radiocityreading1.html.
""". Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. London: Bloomsbury Press, 2000.
""". Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. London: Bloomsbury Press, 2005.
""". Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Vancouver: Raincoast Books, 2000.
""". Interview with Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, Richard and Judy, Channel 4 (UK), June 26, 2006. Transcript, AccioQuote!. Member of the Floo Network. http://www.accio-quote.org/articles/2006/0626-ch4-richardandjudy.html.
""". The Leaky Cauldron and MuggleNet interview J.K. Kathleen Rowling: Part Three. Interview with Melissa Anelli and Emerson Spartz. The Leaky Cauldron. Member of the Floo Network. July 16, 2005. /features/interviews/jkr3.
Sharman-Burke, Juliet and Liz Greene. The Mythic Tarot: A new approach to Tarot cards. Toronto: Fireside, 2000.
Waite, Arthur Edward and Pamela Coleman Smith. The Rider Waite Tarot: The Magician. Stamford, CT: U.S. Games Systems, Inc., Cards Edition, 1971.


text:
Home/Finance/US consumers want to reduce online subscriptions
US consumers want to reduce online subscriptions
Americans are racking up digital subscription bills at a frenetic pace.
They also become concerned about the cost confusion that comes with jumping into the deep end of the monthly subscription pool.
Recent data from Bango, a mobile payment service provider, shows that 72% of American adults believe there are too many subscription services. In addition, the average digital subscriber pays for at least five subscription services per month, and 19% pay for eight or more services.
45% of subscribers say they have a hard time keeping track of where and how they signed up for these subscriptions. Another 35% "have no idea" how much they spend on subscriptions each month, while 34% say they currently pay for a subscription service that "never use".
"This isn't just costing Americans money," the report said. "It also affects their experiences and attitudes towards the subscription economy."
Experts say managing subscriptions is difficult
A big part of the problem is that juggling multiple subscriptions – and multiple payments – is a hassle for online consumers.
"Online subscriptions are difficult to cancel and there is no easy way to manage multiple subscriptions," said Top Mobile Banks founder Tommy Gallagher.
The headaches come from the often complex unsubscribe policies. "That process is often difficult because online subscriptions can be expensive and consumers may not be able to afford multiple subscriptions," Gallagher said.
Since most subscription services only cost $5 or $10 a month, there is some financial subtlety involved.
"Online subscriptions are difficult to manage because subconsciously each subscription is not a lot of money and so it triggers this part of our brain to not pay attention to the price," said Imagine Wealth Group President Jeff Cronenberg. "The advertising is so good for these monthly subscriptions, it's hard to say no." And the structure is so good that it's very confusing to log out."
Pressing the "Cancel" button.
How can you cut through the clutter and start canceling subscription services you don't use or love? Here is a short list.
Know your limits. Make sure you understand what you're signing up for and what you're allowed to access.
"Be sure to set limits on how much content you can access at once and be careful not to let your subscription get out of hand," Gallagher said.
It's also a good idea to keep track of how much content you're consuming and make sure you're using the content you've paid for. "If you're not using the content you've subscribed to, consider canceling your subscription," Gallagher added.
Record the application. Get out the easy way using mobile subscription management apps like Rocket Money, AskTrim, or Pocket Guard.
Each app can automatically cancel unwanted subscriptions, and each can help organize and manage multiple subscription apps. Be prepared to pay a monthly or annual fee to use the best (i.e. premium) services that each of the apps has to offer.
Go online and review the subscription service in question, especially the cancellation instructions. If that doesn't pay off, go straight to the source and call the company. While waiting for a customer support representative is a joyless experience, you'll get the job done that way.
"Cancelling your monthly subscription can be a bit tricky, depending on the service," said The Calculator founder Alastair Hazell. "For example, with Netflix, you can go to their website and click the 'Cancel Subscription' link at the bottom of the page."
If trying to cancel service online is a dead end, contact the company's customer service team, Hazel said.
Block payment. If all else fails, there are ways around subscription brick walls.
"One safe way is to contact your bank and ask them to block your credit card so the subscription service can't charge you again after you cancel," said Made in CA Associate Editor Annie Morris.
Or, as a last resort, have your credit card company get involved in the dispute.
"If it gets to this point, the subscription company will cancel your subscription because they don't want to deal with the headache of a credit card dispute, especially if you have proof that you asked them to cancel," Kronenberg said.
Young couples are separating due to finances, but there is help on the way to keep everything separate but equal
This pharmacy is discounting the price of its period products by 25%
How a Roth IRA rollover can cause unforeseen problems
Following this advice from Ramit Sethi could change your financial life
4 things you need to know about Costco prices


Diabetes care is almost entirely managed by the person who has it. If you%27ve lived with diabetes for any length of time, then you know there%27s no negotiating its demands. Day after day, you alone determine when and what to eat and how much to exercise. It%27s up to you to remember when to take your medication, how often to check your blood glucose level, and what to do if your blood sugar levels are too high or too low.
Successful management of diabetes—even under the most ideal circumstances—requires great discipline, not to mention specific knowledge, skills, and tools for self-care. When vision loss enters the picture—as it frequently does as the disease advances—there%27s yet another level of complication and risk added to your treatment regimen.
Perhaps you%27re one of the 3.2 million Americans now living with both conditions—an occurrence that will grow even more common as the nation%27s retirement-aged population increases. If so, then you%27ve also had to confront the frustrating fact that almost all diabetes equipment is still designed with the assumption that the user will be able to see enough detail to use it properly. Regular and small print are standard for diabetes-related information, equipment instructions, and prescription labels.
The good news is that, for the last 20 years, many diabetes care professionals, equipment manufacturers, and people with visual impairment have been working tirelessly to address these challenges. The result is that, today, there are more viable, accessible resources and techniques to help people with visual impairments manage their diabetes than ever before.
In addition to these articles, you will also find a list of general diabetes resources.


This audio explores concepts such as religion, cults, what and who "another Jesus" is (2 Cor. 11:1-4), theological term switching, and the importance of defining the biblical Jesus Christ, before and during Christian evangelism to those in "false christ" belief systems. Definitions and concepts are illustrated with various quotes and mentions of (1) non-Christian cults, (2) major world religions, (3) secular belief systems, and (4) the NewAge/occult.
Other important topics include (5) defining terminology versus semantic suicide, (6) cultic close-mindedness and isolation, (7) avoiding cult stratagems of psychological confusion and the element of surprise, (8) how cults exalt man and demote Jesus Christ, (9) the danger of believing doctrines of demons (1 Tim. 4:1-2), and finally (10) "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try [test] the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world." (1 John 4:1-6).
Scriptures: 2 Cor. 11:12-15; Matt. 16:16-18; John 8:24, 1 John 4:1-6; 1 Thess. 5:21; 1 Tim. 4:1-5.


text:
Golang eztv scraper

## install

    go get github.com/LuckaLP/eztv-scrape

## usage

Below is an example which shows some common use cases for eztv-scrape, src from
[exaples/examples.go](https://github.com/LuckaLP/eztv-scrape/blob/master/examples/examples.go) .

```go
package main

import (
	"fmt"

	ez "github.com/LuckaLP/eztv-scrape"
)

func init() {
	ez.PathShowWordList = "../data/ShowWordList.txt"
	ez.PathShowWordDb = "../data/ShowWordDb.txt"

	ez.PathShowList = "../data/ShowList.txt"
	ez.PathShowDb = "../data/ShowDb.txt"

	ez.PathFilterReservedWordsList = "../data/FilterReservedWordsList.txt"
	ez.PathMatchListSeasonEpisode = "../data/MatchListSeasonEpisode.txt"
}

func printShows() {
	shows, err := ez.ScrapeShowsList()
	if err != nil {
		fmt.Printf("ERR: %+v\n", err)
		return
	}
	for _, show := range shows {
		fmt.Printf("ID: %-12d\t%-60s\t%-24s\t%s\t%s\n", show.ID, show.Link, show.Status, show.Rating, show.Title)
	}
}

func printShowInfo(showLink string) {
	show := ez.Show{Link: showLink}
	err := show.ScrapeInfo()
	if err != nil {
		return
	}
	fmt.Printf("ID: %d\nTitle: %s\nStatus: %s\nRating: %s\nRating Votes: %s\n", show.ID, show.Title, show.Status, show.Rating, show.RatingVotes)

}

func printShowEpisodes(showLink string) {
	show := ez.Show{Link: showLink}
	if err := show.ScrapeEpisodes(); err != nil {
		return
	}
	for _, epp := range *show.Episodes {
		fmt.Printf("\tS%02dE%02d\t%+v%s\n", epp.Season, epp.Episode, epp.Title, "")
	}
}

func main() {
	printShows()
	printShowInfo("/shows/1000/the-100/")
	printShowEpisodes("/shows/1000/the-100/")
}
```


We are proud to post our first exclusive "Wicked" cast member interview – with Ms. Stephanie Torns, who is in the ensemble and understudies Elphaba on the 1st National Tour of "Wicked". If you see the first national tour and she's not playing Elphaba, you'll hear her singing "No one cries they won't return" in "No One Mourns the Wicked" and "I hear that she can shed her skin as easily as a snake!" in "Thank Goodness!" We appreciate Stephanie being kind enough to give us this interview and wish her the best in performances to come!
-My first professional acting job out of college was "The Producers" in Hilton Head, South Carolina.
-It was a total of about two and a half weeks. It was a bit strange for me because I've never joined a show that's been up and running already, so when you learn the show it's just you by yourself with the dance captain. So it was a little scary in the sense that you just have to really know your numbers on the stage so you don't cause any problems with the show. Then I had my dress rehearsal which is called a "put in" and its you and the entire company running the show but only you are in costume and everyone else is in street clothes. Then I went on that night!
-Hmmmm my favorite costume for my ensemble track is my Ozdust ballroom black and white dress! For Elphaba, it's definitely the second act dress it's just soooo unbelievably beautiful.
How was the initial rehearsal process for Elphaba, and what was your first performance like?
-Well once I was put into the show for my ensemble track, we immediately started the Elphaba material. Rehearsal process for this was very fun and ALOT of information thrown at you to learn. My first performance on was in Appleton, Wisconsin and it was a complete outer body experience!! But my family was out there so I knew they would be proud no matter what! 🙂 Of course every show after that I am able to enjoy myself out there and not be as nervous!
-My favorite song to sing in the ensemble is the opening of the show because it's just such a wonderful way to bring the audience into the story of what just happened. My favorite scene is either Dancing Through Life or Ozdust because we get to have so much fun up there and enjoy one another. For Elphaba my favorite song to sing is Defying Gravity because it's the climax of the show for her and the lyrics are just so moving to me. My favorite scene has got to be the cat fight scene!! It shows both women in different ways, because it has strength and laughter all at once.
-Oh my. Well there are A LOT of things that happen sometimes, but I would say its ALWAYS funny to see someone wipe out in the opening. I've done it twice and so have many other people.
-Never give up. This business is a lot of rejection, and you just have to believe in yourself and your dreams and just learn from all of your experiences. I'm a true believe that everything happens for a reason!
We thank Ms. Torns again for her time and wish her the best! To the readers – keep watching for two more exclusive interviews headed your way very soon!
This entry was posted in Exclusive Interviews and tagged 1st National Tour Production, Stephanie Torns. Bookmark the permalink.
"Well truth be told, ever since high school, I've always wanted to play Elphaba one day."
I think this is fantastic! I'm very happy for her.
Me too! And I'm thrilled she was so willing to do the interview – and three more people have agreed to do them, so keep watching!
What a great interview! Nice questions and I really enjoyed reading her answers.
Wow, what a great interview–good questions, wonderful answers! Thanks!
Nice interview. Very fun to read.


7 best open source network management projects.
nodewatcher - A modular open networks growing platform.
nodewatcher is one of the projects of wlan slovenija open wireless network. Its main goal is the development of an open source network planning, deployment, monitoring and maintanance platform with emphasis on community. This is the development branch with future (3.0) version of nodewatcher which is still being developed and does not have all the functionality found in the 2.0 version. For stable 2.0 version, switch to the master branch.
An awesome list of resources to design, implement and operate computer networks.
Please, use this repository for any bug report, patch submission and pull-requests.
Whilst ygot is designed to work with any YANG module, for OpenConfig modules, it can provide transformations of the schema to optimise the data structures that are produced for use in systems that generate data instances of the models for configuration purposes. These helper methods require that the OpenConfig style guide patterns are implemented, a model can be verified to conform with these requirements using the OpenConfig linter. Note: This is not an official Google product.
Network Discovery and Management Toolkit (ndmtk) makes Ansible "work" for both Traditional and Software-Defined Network (SDN) network management. The future of network management lies in the area of Artificial Intelligence. Any network-enabled device will be able to build connectivity to a remote peer on-demand, without human intervention. The restraint on that ability are the AI-enabled systems acting as gatekeepers. AI is impossible without ongoing data collection, data analysis, probing, and modeling. As such, networks of the future need tools to perform the above tasks.


EverZinc announced the acquisition of G.H.C, the Canadian manufacturer and exporter of French Process zinc oxide products.
LOS ANGELES & PARIS — OpenGate Capital, a global private equity firm, announced today that its portfolio company, EverZinc, a European specialty zinc chemical business, has acquired G.H. Chemicals Ltd., and Microzinc Inc., collectively referred to as "GHC", a Canadian manufacturer and exporter of French Process zinc oxide products. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
GHC was established in 1974 and is based in Saint Hyacinthe, Quebec. Through its manufacturing facility, GHC produces four grades of French Process zinc oxide used for pharmaceutical and food products, as well as fertilizer and feed grades, and various grades for rubber compounding. The business was acquired from Mr. Stephan Tabah and Mr. Philippe Bailet. GHC has a seasoned team of professionals and a highly trained employee base of 58 people serving a customer base of industrial, pharmaceutical and agriculture customers.
OpenGate has completed two add-on investments including G.H. Chemicals and Aico S.P.A, an Italian manufacturer of home heating products, an add-on to Jøtul Group, acquired in March of 2018.


TUCSON, Ariz. — The federal judge killed in the Arizona shooting rampage was known for an immigration ruling that got him death threats, but on Friday he was remembered as a man devoted to his family, his basset hounds and his Irish-Catholic heritage.
U.S. District Judge John Roll had stopped by a supermarket meet-and-greet for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Saturday when he was killed, along with five others. Giffords, recovering from a gunshot wound to the head, was still in critical condition, but progressing.
Roll's funeral Friday came amid tight security, as police officers and SWAT team members patrolled the neighborhood around St. Elizabeth Ann Seton church. About a dozen coach buses brought judges who knew Roll over the years.
The speakers focused less on Judge Roll and more on John Roll, tender and at times goofy, and largely hidden from those he served.
The news media were barred from the event at the request of Roll's family and for security reasons. The Associated Press interviewed mourners, such as Bahill, as they left the service and got an account of the funeral.
Roll's older brother, Ed, told mourners that his family moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh when Roll was a child because their mother's health was failing and doctors thought the weather might help.
When Roll's mother eventually died, of a heart condition, the future judge was just 15.
Her death deeply affected him and he changed his middle name from Paul to his mother's maiden name of McCarthy "to keep that part of the family alive," Bahill said.
His brother said he stepped in as Roll's de facto parent, driving him to school and chaperoning him on some dances.
Bahill said she appreciated gaining more insight into the private life and personality of Roll. His funeral comes a day after the youngest victim, Christina Taylor Green, was eulogized, also at the same church.
Many members of Roll's family, including his sons and five grandchildren, participated in the funeral Mass and speakers also included a childhood friend, his chief clerk and a colleague on the federal bench.
Dignitaries attending included Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer as well as Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl. Former Vice President Dan Quayle brought a handwritten message from former President George H.W. Bush, who appointed Roll to the bench in 1991, said Adam Goldberg, a spokesman for the fire department and the event.
Before Jan. 8, Roll, 63, was known for the death threats he received after his ruling in a border-crossing case two years ago. He needed 24-hour protection after he said 16 illegal immigrants could file a civil rights claim against an Arizona border rancher.
Roll had stopped by Giffords' event after attending Mass to see the Democratic lawmaker and thank her for her fight for more federal judges in southwest Arizona to help with a dramatic increase in felony federal cases linked to illegal immigration.
Giffords' husband, Mark Kelly, was among the mourners Friday. In a brief news conference, her doctors said she was progressing in her recovery.
Jared Loughner, 22, has been charged with murder and attempted murder for Roll's death and the assassination attempt against Giffords. Documents released Friday showed that he bought bullets at a Walmart and posted "Goodbye friends" on the Internet.
Roll's death leaves a huge hole in the federal judiciary in Arizona, not just because of his reputation as a fair-minded and hardworking jurist, said Paul Carter, assistant attorney general for the state of Arizona.
He was a vocal advocate of getting more help for the state's overtaxed federal bench, Carter said.
"Our court down here is already quite over-stressed with a number of issues relating to the border especially and Judge Roll was a champion of trying to get more resources down to southern Arizona," he said.
The speakers, however, did not dwell on Roll's killing. They focused on lighthearted moments from his life.
The judge's lifelong friend, Rev. John Lyons, recounted how as boys it was not uncommon for Roll to find himself sitting on a different kind of bench — the one outside the principal's office.
Other speakers joked that Roll was "spatially challenged" and got lost driving to McDonald's. He once backed his car into his own garage and on another occasion ran into someone's classic Jaguar.
Roll's brother, Ed, also told of the family's annual camping trip to Lake Roosevelt in Arizona for Father's Day, which drew strenuous objections from the judge's wife because of temperatures that reached into the triple digits.
"She called it the vacation from hell," said Bob McLaughlin, 64, who recounted the story told at the funeral.
Some of Roll's neighbors said they never suspected his line of work, particularly because Roll never seemed pretentious and enjoyed everyday activities, such as walking his two basset hounds every morning and spending time with his wife and grandchildren.


text:
14-year-old Far Rockaway girl lured two to gang-related deaths on promise of sex: cops
By Catherina Gioino and Graham Rayman
Dec 25, 2018 | 11:05 AM
Remnants of yellow police line tape remain at the scene behind the Inwood Community Center on Lawrence Avenue where the body of Harold Sermeno was found, Monday. (Jeff Bachner for New York Daily News)
A Queens teen killed on Long Island by suspected gang members was likely lured to his death by the same 14-year-old girl accused of enticing another victim who was murdered days earlier in a nearby park, sources said.
Harold Sermeno, 17, had just started working at an East Rockaway restaurant when he was found shot to death outside Five Towns Community Center on Dec.18.
Police are investigating a lead that he was lured to his death on the same promise of sex that did in Ian Cruz, 23, who was found in Bayswater Point State Park on Dec. 16.
Court records revealed Cruz was found partially naked, with only blue underwear and white socks on, and with gunshot wounds to his head.
Cops have arrested a crew of suspected MS-13 gang members, including the girl, and charged them with Cruz' murder. Sources said they believe the murders are linked.
[More New York] Former inmate sues city over allegations he was raped at Rikers »
"You have these young people luring innocent victims to the park to murder them," a police source said. "There's no financial motive. It's a pretty startling case."
Sermeno had just gotten a new job washing dishes at the Villa Maria restaurant.
"He worked only for a couple days," said co-owner Maria Zaino, 75. "He came to try out Sunday and then he worked Monday. And I paid him that night. He was supposed to come back Tuesday but he never showed up."
[More New York] Police find woman's decomposing body in her Bronx bedroom, boyfriend sought for questioning »
Zaino said his new worker hadn't even finished filling out his paperwork yet.
"I got mad because he didn't come back to work," Zaino said. "His work was great. He was very hardworking and attentive. But that's all I can say. He was a good worker."
A security guard at the community center where Sermeno's body was found said the victim attended Lawrence High School and was enrolled in the community center's "Alternative Tutoring" program.
The girl and her 15-year-old brother were among four roommates arrested in connection with Cruz' murder after a raid on their Far Rockaway home. A fifth roommate, Elmer Guttierez, was charged with weapons possession. Cops said they found the .22-caliber revolver that was used to kill Cruz along with over 900 rounds of ammunition in the apartment.
Prosecutors say the roommates shot Cruz multiple times in the head in the park sometime during the 16 hours before his body was discovered.
Guttierez, who has not been charged in the murder, is being held on $250,000 bail. His roommates — the 14-year-old girl, a 15-year-old boy, Carlos Guerra, 18, and Yonathan Sanchez, 22 — were all ordered held without bail.
The Daily News is withholding the names of the siblings because they are being charged as juveniles.
[More New York] Artist beaten into coma by stranger over stare down at NYC bodega has died: relatives »
Since 2010, federal prosecutors have charged MS-13 members with carrying out over four dozen murders in the New York area, many in Long Island and Queens.


text:
O para-cimeno, p-cimeno,  (p – isopropil tolueno, 1-isopropil-4-metilbenzeno ou metilpropil benzeno) é um hidrocarboneto aromático, de fórmula molecular C10H14, líquido, sem coloração, de odor agradável e insolúvel em água.

O para-cimeno é um produto importante na indústria química, principalmente como solvente industrial de tintas e vernizes, produção de resinas sintéticas e orto-cresol, uso em perfumarias e fluido térmico.

É produzido industrialmente a partir da alquilação do tolueno ou a partir da desidrogenação catalítica do limoneno, sendo um produto irritante para a pele e para os olhos e tóxico, se for ingerido.

Alquilbenzenos

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Zuckerberg's Facebook 'Supreme Court' Can't Handle All the Disputes
Shira Ovide
Bloomberg June 24, 2019
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Facebook Inc. appears to be moving ahead with the Supreme Court-like content oversight board it has been discussing for a year. It's a worthy step but also a 1% solution for a unimaginably vast problem. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's co-founder and chief executive officer, has been talking for more than a year about an independent authority that would become a final arbiter about whether a social network post should stay online or be wiped away for breaching the company's rules against hate speech, calls to violence or other abuses. People can also appeal to the independent body if they think one of their posts has been unfairly flagged or removed. Facebook has solicited feedback on the structure for this Supreme Court-like body, and Bloomberg News on Monday described some of the company's deliberations to come up with the best structure and policies. (Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law School professor and Bloomberg Opinion columnist, pitched the concept of an independent oversight board to Facebook. I haven't spoken with him about this oversight body.)This is a promising idea, and I'm glad that Facebook, Google's YouTube, Twitter Inc. and other internet gathering places are all (belatedly) thinking hard about how to deal with the inevitable and sometimes deadly downsides of giving billions of people a public megaphone. Sensible principles, however, must be tested and revised against reality, and I hope when the board does its work it will give the public opportunities to assess how well it's working. But no one can pretend that this board of perhaps dozens of people will be able to tackle more than a minuscule fraction of disputed posts a year. That's useful for high-profile judgment calls, such as the doctored video of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that surfaced recently on Facebook and for which Facebook faced criticism about how it handled the situation. Indeed, a Facebook executive suggested recently that the oversight board would be helpful for "dozens" of cases every year in which there is debate within the company on the right approach for a post or video. Dozens of cases are immaterial to Facebook's scale. The company says that it gets millions of reports every week from people worldwide who believe posts have nudity, graphic violence, hate speech or other potentially inappropriate materials. Many of the judgement calls are made by relatively low-wage contractors who are left scarred by the experience of sifting through the worst of humanity to make split-second calls on whether a post violates Facebook's rules. It is the hidden horror show behind the internet's most popular hangouts. A Supreme Court would be the opposite end of this. A high gloss, highly selective, presumably well-paid group that would would deliberate how to best balance free expression and the protection of people from harassment, violence or manipulation. Facebook likes ideas that "scale," and the Supreme Court cannot possible scale to the 2.7 billion people who use Facebook's internet hangouts. That doesn't mean it's not worth doing, but let's also not pretend an oversight board is anything close to a silver bullet. I also can't help think that there is too much focus on Facebook's policies and procedures and not enough on what the company does in real life. Facebook's favorite excuse is that terrorism, calls to violence, promotions of illegal drugs, child exploitation or other abuses "are not allowed" on its internet hangouts. That's because Facebook has written rules, and those rules have specific prohibitions against all manner of misdeeds. And yet all those abuses are rampant because Facebook exists in the real world and not on paper.Facebook is a reflection of the world, with the best and worst of humanity amplified and exposed to a wide audience. That means Facebook's good intentions don't matter. Its purported diligence and earnestness do not matter. What matters is what the company does when its good intentions meet reality, and too often Facebook has failed in that regard. Groups in Myanmar complained repeatedly that people in the country were systematically harnessing Facebook to sow hatred and violence against the Rohingya ethnic minority in the country, and yet Facebook could not or would not do anything to stop it. Would the supporters of the Rohingya in Myanmar be served by a Facebook Supreme Court? Would it matter if they appealed to an oversight board about genocide after the fact? Again and again, people broadcast in real time acts of violence on Facebook, and the company believes it should continue to allow live video on its site that is difficult or impossible to police until after the harm has already been done. Setting and enforcing rules for 2.7 billion people is not simple. Dealing with an open space for billions of people is often reactionary. Facebook too often ignores systematic problems until someone important complains or until it's too glaringly obvious to ignore. Each country also has its own norms about the appropriate balance of free expression and harmful speech. And one post or photo on its own may be innocuous but it becomes dangerous as part of a pattern to encourage violence or sow division in an electorate. Assuming it is transparent about its work, having an oversight board for Facebook's high-profile content disputes is a good step. But the public and regulators should continue to press Facebook and its peers on the bigger, pernicious problems.To contact the author of this story: Shira Ovide at sovide@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Daniel Niemi at dniemi1@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Shira Ovide is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. She previously was a reporter for the Wall Street Journal.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Facebook Inc. appears to be moving ahead with the Supreme Court-like content oversight board it has been discussing for a year. It's a worthy step but also a 1% solution for a unimaginably vast problem.
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's co-founder and chief executive officer, has been talking for more than a year about an independent authority that would become a final arbiter about whether a social network post should stay online or be wiped away for breaching the company's rules against hate speech, calls to violence or other abuses. People can also appeal to the independent body if they think one of their posts has been unfairly flagged or removed.
Facebook has solicited feedback on the structure for this Supreme Court-like body, and Bloomberg News on Monday described some of the company's deliberations to come up with the best structure and policies. (Noah Feldman, a Harvard Law School professor and Bloomberg Opinion columnist, pitched the concept of an independent oversight board to Facebook. I haven't spoken with him about this oversight body.)
This is a promising idea, and I'm glad that Facebook, Google's YouTube, Twitter Inc. and other internet gathering places are all (belatedly) thinking hard about how to deal with the inevitable and sometimes deadly downsides of giving billions of people a public megaphone. Sensible principles, however, must be tested and revised against reality, and I hope when the board does its work it will give the public opportunities to assess how well it's working.
But no one can pretend that this board of perhaps dozens of people will be able to tackle more than a minuscule fraction of disputed posts a year. That's useful for high-profile judgment calls, such as the doctored video of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that surfaced recently on Facebook and for which Facebook faced criticism about how it handled the situation. Indeed, a Facebook executive suggested recently that the oversight board would be helpful for "dozens" of cases every year in which there is debate within the company on the right approach for a post or video.
Dozens of cases are immaterial to Facebook's scale. The company says that it gets millions of reports every week from people worldwide who believe posts have nudity, graphic violence, hate speech or other potentially inappropriate materials. Many of the judgement calls are made by relatively low-wage contractors who are left scarred by the experience of sifting through the worst of humanity to make split-second calls on whether a post violates Facebook's rules. It is the hidden horror show behind the internet's most popular hangouts.
A Supreme Court would be the opposite end of this. A high gloss, highly selective, presumably well-paid group that would would deliberate how to best balance free expression and the protection of people from harassment, violence or manipulation. Facebook likes ideas that "scale," and the Supreme Court cannot possible scale to the 2.7 billion people who use Facebook's internet hangouts. That doesn't mean it's not worth doing, but let's also not pretend an oversight board is anything close to a silver bullet.
I also can't help think that there is too much focus on Facebook's policies and procedures and not enough on what the company does in real life. Facebook's favorite excuse is that terrorism, calls to violence, promotions of illegal drugs, child exploitation or other abuses "are not allowed" on its internet hangouts. That's because Facebook has written rules, and those rules have specific prohibitions against all manner of misdeeds. And yet all those abuses are rampant because Facebook exists in the real world and not on paper.
Facebook is a reflection of the world, with the best and worst of humanity amplified and exposed to a wide audience. That means Facebook's good intentions don't matter. Its purported diligence and earnestness do not matter. What matters is what the company does when its good intentions meet reality, and too often Facebook has failed in that regard.
Groups in Myanmar complained repeatedly that people in the country were systematically harnessing Facebook to sow hatred and violence against the Rohingya ethnic minority in the country, and yet Facebook could not or would not do anything to stop it. Would the supporters of the Rohingya in Myanmar be served by a Facebook Supreme Court? Would it matter if they appealed to an oversight board about genocide after the fact? Again and again, people broadcast in real time acts of violence on Facebook, and the company believes it should continue to allow live video on its site that is difficult or impossible to police until after the harm has already been done.
Setting and enforcing rules for 2.7 billion people is not simple. Dealing with an open space for billions of people is often reactionary. Facebook too often ignores systematic problems until someone important complains or until it's too glaringly obvious to ignore. Each country also has its own norms about the appropriate balance of free expression and harmful speech. And one post or photo on its own may be innocuous but it becomes dangerous as part of a pattern to encourage violence or sow division in an electorate.
Assuming it is transparent about its work, having an oversight board for Facebook's high-profile content disputes is a good step. But the public and regulators should continue to press Facebook and its peers on the bigger, pernicious problems.
To contact the author of this story: Shira Ovide at sovide@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Daniel Niemi at dniemi1@bloomberg.net
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Shira Ovide is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. She previously was a reporter for the Wall Street Journal.
For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion
Trump Says He's Looking 'Very Seriously' at Pentagon Cloud Deal
India's Unicorns Are More Like Workhorses
No, Facebook Should Not Buy Square for $70 Billion
China's New Nasdaq-Style Venue Set for Monday Trading Start
Democrats are attacking the wrong companies
I tried being the third person in a poly relationship—here's how it went
Hello Giggles
911s Are So Special That Porsche Only Makes The Same One Twice a Year


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