text:
Big World
How Clear Channel Programs America
By Jeff Sharlet
On July 17, 2002, as a band called The Boils was preparing to play, seven men with badges, police officers and agents of Philadelphia's Department of Licenses and Inspections, walked into the basement of the First Unitarian Church at Chestnut and Van Pelt. Nobody knows who tipped them off, but it was clear that someone wanted the Church, as the club in the basement was called, shut down. The show's promoter, Sean Agnew, had been booking acts there for six years, but before the night when the inspectors appeared his shows had not warranted a single official complaint. A tall, lean twenty-four-year-old with a stubbled undertaker's jaw and long, dark eyelashes, Agnew almost always wore a black mesh cap, with DORM SLUT scrawled on it graffitistyle in silver Sharpie, crammed over thick black hair. He was known locally, and in little music magazines around the country, as "DJR500." Agnew's shows were "straight-edge," which meant that drugs and alcohol were not welcome. A local paper had recently named him a man of the year, alongside 76ers guard Allen Iverson.
The Department of Licenses and Inspections does not keep records of complaints. All the deputy commissioner could tell Agnew was that someone had gone down to City Hall, pulled the Church's permit, and discovered that the Church was not zoned to hold gatherings for entertainment purposes. No bingo, no swing dancing, and definitely no Boils. The inspectors gave Agnew a red-and-white-striped "Cease Work/Operations" sticker to affix to the Church's door and declared the concert over.
Agnew got on stage and told everyone to go home; his friends circulated through the crowd, whispering that the show was moving to West Philadelphia, to a theater called The Rotunda. Soon Agnew cut a deal to produce all his concerts there, but he was able to put on only one more show before the Department of Licenses and Inspections shut that operation down as well. Someone had gone down to City Hall, pulled the theater's permit, and discovered that it was zoned for drama only. Then inspectors visited the record shop where Agnew sold his tickets, with the news that someone had gone down to City Hall, pulled the shop's permit, and found out that it wasn't zoned for selling tickets. A few days later the inspectors were back at the shop, looking for a box under the counter in which the store kept Agnew's mail-another violation, reported by yet another concerned citizen.
Although he had no evidence, Agnew's suspicions fell on Clear Channel Communications. Clear Channel controls almost every concert venue in and around Philadelphia -- from the Theater of the Living Arts on South Street to the Tweeter Center in Camden -- as well as six radio stations and nearly 700 billboards. The company's local viceroy, a man named Larry Magid, once ran the city's live-music scene as a private fiefdom. Now, since Clear Channel bought him out in 2000, he manages it as a corporate franchise. Clear Channel maintains a similar chokehold on live music in almost every major city in America, as well as in most of the small ones. Agnew, who had managed to book bands that could have made far more money playing Clear Channel theaters, suspected that he was grit in the machine.
"Four or five years ago," Agnew told me one day in the record shop, where he also works as a clerk, "there were a lot more people aware of corporate power." Now, he said, money so dominated the music scene that a lot of younger kids didn't even know what "selling out" meant. When I asked him what had kept him in business, he corrected me: "I don't consider what I got into a 'business.'" Many Philadelphia music fans had rallied to his defense, he explained. After the closures, Agnew sent out word to his email list, 8,000 people who had attended at least one of his shows, and within days 1,000 of them had written to City Hall. He rented a paid mailbox. He persuaded a lawyer to represent the Church pro bono, and soon the Church had a dance-hall permit, the record shop had a ticket-selling permit, and Agnew had more events scheduled than before he was shut down.
Whoever was behind the attempt to close the Church, nearly every concertgoer I talked to blamed Clear Channel. They adored Agnew for "standing up to the evil empire," as one musician put it. Agnew, a vegetarian who lives with a cat and thousands of obsessively organized records, is now the most authentic rock and roller in the city. When he walks down the street, people nod and smile and pat him on the back. DJR500 is huge, and one day soon Clear Channel might make him an offer.
Some people complain about Clear Channel because they miss their old, independent stations, some because Clear Channel stations shrink playlists and recycle an ever smaller number of songs. Musicians say touring has become a cross-country hopscotch from one Clear Channel venue to another, each more sterile than the last; their agents and managers say that if artists don't play when and where Clear Channel says, they will suffer less airplay or none. As journalists point out, Clear Channel has made commercial radio nearly reporting-free, believing that its syndication of Rush Limbaugh to as many stations as possible fulfills its mandate to provide news and political diversity. Evangelical Christians are distressed about radio firsts pioneered by Clear Channel DJs, such as torturing and killing live animals on the air (a chicken in Denver, a pig in Florida), but this can happen only where there's a DJ: Clear Channel has put hundreds of radio veterans out of work, replacing them with canned broadcasts tailored to sound local and live. Consumer advocates argue that such robot radio is the only efficiency Clear Channel has passed along to the public. In the last several years, they point out, the cost of "free" radio -- in terms of time spent enduring ads -- has spiked. Concert tickets have jumped from an average of $25 to more than $40, and radio advertising rates have risen by two thirds, pricing small businesses off the airwaves.
Clear Channel says that its enemies snipe simply because it's big, and this is probably true. No one had imagined that a radio company could get so big. When Clear Channel was founded in 1972, with one station bought by a San Antonio investment banker named L. Lowry Mays, federal law forbade a company from owning more than seven FM stations and seven AMs, By the 1990s, that cap had crept up to forty stations nationwide, no more than two per market. Then, in 1996, Congress passed the Telecommunications Act. Up to eight stations per market would be allowed, and as many overall as a company could digest. Within less than a year more than 1,000 mergers occurred; by 2000 four behemoths dominated the business. Today, Clear Channel rules.
Z-100 in New York? Clear Channel. K-BIG in L.A.? Clear Channel. KISS in Chicago? Clear Channel. KISS, POWER, the FOX, and the ZONE are all Clear Channel brands, and the dozens of radio stations nationwide that bear one of those names take their orders from San Antonio, where Clear Channel's headquarters remain, in an unassuming limestone box next to a golf course. Rush Limbaugh is Clear Channel, and so are Dr. Laura, Casey Kasem, and Glenn Beck, the rising star of rant radio who organized the "Rally for America" prowar demonstrations.
Last June, when the FCC raised the caps on how much access to the American public any one media company could control -- a move too crassly reminiscent of the days of robber barons for even the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, which voted 400-21 to roll it back -- the one media company the commission hinted might actually be too big was Clear Channel. The recent debate in Congress over television ownership has focused on two numbers: 35 percent, which is the portion of American viewers to which a single TV-station owner can currently broadcast, and 45 percent, which strikes media giants as a more reasonable number. Clear Channel, meanwhile, reaches roughly 200 million people, or more than 70 percent of the American public. It owns 1,225 stations within the United States, or around 11 percent overall, and greater portions in major markets. It broadcasts from at least 200 more stations abroad, many clustered just south of the border like radio maquiladoras, and it owns or controls more live-music venues than any other company. In the first six months of 2003, Clear Channel sold more tickets than the forty-nine next largest promoters combined; in 2001, it claimed 70 percent of the total live-music take. The billboards that ring the stadiums, line the highways, clutter the skyline? Clear Channel owns most of those too.
As a business enterprise, Clear Channel is an experiment. It is giant and potentially unstable, more reliant on muscle than on financial Anesse, and to date only moderately profitable. A sort of Frankenstein's monster, it was built from the parts of once-dying industries and jolted into life by the 1996 Telecommunications Act. Supporters of the law say there was no choice; at the time, more than half the stations in the country were losing money. Opponents retort that Clear Channel is hardly a democratic solution. "I don't think there was anybody in Washington in 1996 who could have imagined that a few years later there'd be one company owning 1,200 stations," says Michael Copps, one of the two commissioners on the FCC's five-person board who opposed raising ownership caps. "We should never give anybody the ability to have that much power."
When I asked to interview Clear Channel's executives, a P.R. rep for the company told me that Clear Channel wouldn't talk to me, because it no longer needs the media: a Zen koan of consolidation. After the company learned that several underlings had talked nevertheless, radio CEO John Hogan agreed to speak with me on the phone. An amiable, forty-six-year-old former radio-ad salesman, he told me that "the key to radio is that it's a very personal, intimate medium." Hogan's first executive role was as the general manager of WPCH, a fully automated station in Atlanta known as "the Peach." Hogan made running the station sound like changing a diaper. "It was a 'beautiful music' station," he said. "You didn't have to make any decisions. all you did was put the tape on in the morning and you let it run for twenty-four hours and then you changed it the next day. There were no decisions to make, they were made for you. It was nice, you know, it was easy."
His idea of what radio is and can be does not seem to have changed since his days at the Peach. "People use radio 'cause it works," he told me. "If it stops working for 'em, they stop it." The "they" he was referring to were the advertisers. "For the first time ever, we can talk to advertisers about a true national radio footprint," he told me. "If you have a younger, female-skewing advertiser who wants access to that audience, we can give them stations in, you know, Boston and New York and Miami and Chicago, literally across the country. Los Angeles, San Francisco . . . We can take outdoor [ads] and radio, and drive people to live events and concerts and capture the excitement, the real visceral experience." The goal? "A different kind of advertising opportunity."
Hogan was promoted to radio CEO just over a year ago. He has tried to soften the company's image after several years of brutal acquisitions under the leadership of Randy Michaels, the former disc jockey who now manages the company's new-technologies division. Clear Channel wouldn't let me talk with Michaels, but not long after he left the radio division he gave a trade publication called Radio Ink an even blunter rationale for the company's push to dominate live music as it does radio. "People attending a concert are experiencing something with tremendous emotion," he said. "They're . . . vulnerable."
Across town from the Church, in a little club called the Khyber Pass, I went to see a show booked by Clear Channel's man in Philadelphia. The headliner was a band called The Dragons, best known for their album Rock Like Fuck, but the night belonged to the opening act, the Riverboat Gamblers, or, rather, to their singer, Teko. Tall, skinny, gruesomely pretty, he vibrated across the two-foot-high stage, shouting loud and hard. No one was there to see the bands; the crowd, maybe a hundred strong, was there to get drunk, or to take someone home. But everyone in the room -- a cigar box painted matte black from top to bottom, beer on the floor and loose wiring dangling from the ceiling -- pressed forward, chins bobbing, drunken eyes widening. Near the end of a song called "Hey, Hey, Hey," Teko jumped and landed on the two-step riser at the front of the stage. It slid away, sent him crashing onto his spine. His left hand clutched the mike, into which he continued to scream; his right hand, flailing to its beat even faster, had begun to bleed at the palm. Then he jolted off the floor, bit the mike, and launched into another song: "I get the feelin' you're gonna need a feedin'! Let's eat! Let's eat! Let's eat!"
A few minutes later, Clear Channel's man jammed himself into the edge of the crowd, grinning and rocking his head as the singer leaped from the stage and drove into the audience, swinging his bloody hand like a wrecking ball. Clear Channel's man loved it. Bryan Dilworth was a big man with small eyes and a head of thinning red hair that brought to mind Curly of the Three Stooges. He was in what he called "that moment." He grinned and rocked his head; he stopped scanning the room and actually watched the band. He elbowed me, nodding toward the Riverboat Gamblers, as if to say, "See? See?"
When the song ended, Dilworth stepped back from the crowd, returned to the bar in the next room, and ordered another Jameson's.
"Dude," he said. "That is what I'm f**cking talking about."
Meaning the scene, the variables, "the combustibles": everything he claimed Clear Channel could never buy. That included himself. At various times, Dilworth told me he worked for Clear Channel, or didn't work for Clear Channel, or Clear Channel simply didn't matter. Sometimes he called Clear Channel "the evil empire"; sometimes he said it was the best thing that ever happened to his town. It was hard to know which Dilworth to believe: the one who took me up to the cluttered office of his private company, Curt Flood, two stories above the Khyber Pass, to play me tracks from one of his bands on a cheap boom box; or the one who took me on a tour of a Clear Channel hall and conceded that the paychecks that mattered came from Clear Channel, that he had a Clear Channel email address and a Clear Channel phone number, that he was in truth a Clear Channel "talent buyer" responsible for filling the calendars of a dozen Clear Channel venues around the city. At times Dilworth spoke of Clear Channel Philadelphia in the first person. "I am living proof," he told me more than once, "that Clear Channel Philadelphia is going to rock."
This flexibility was what made Dilworth such a valuable asset. Unlike Starbucks or Borders, Clear Channel does not build its empire from new franchises but rather goes from town to town and buys local operations. Clear Channel has Dilworths in every city with a scene, and what makes them so effective is precisely that their affiliation with the company is subject to doubt, even in their own minds. Dilworth develops "baby bands" in clubs like the Khyber on his own time and filters the most marketable of them to the more lucrative venues he books as his alter ego, a Clear Channel talent buyer. Such a double role appears to be part of the Clear Channel business plan, in which the independents who should be an alternative to Clear Channel instead become the company's farm team. As a result, live music is following the route taken by radio. Songs that sound the same are performed in venues that look the same and even have the same name: identically branded venues, all controlled by Clear Channel, brick-and-mortar embodiments of KISS, the FOX, and the ZONE.
"Everything is so fucked," said Dilworth, another shot of Jameson's at his lips. "Music business my ass. Take the 'music' off and that's what it is." He drank the shot, and then he was talking about the Riverboat Gamblers again: Those dudes got it, they're going places, and Dilworth would take them there, Clear Channel all the way. That's not monopoly, said Dilworth, it's business in America. "Deregulation set this table a long time ago. I'm not taking a 'can't beat 'em then join 'em' attitude, but..." He trailed off, because, of course, he was.
Dilworth's contradictory relationship with Clear Channel extended even into his home life. His wife, Kristin Thomson, worked for the Future of Music Coalition, the leading activist group against consolidation. FMC's head, Jenny Toomey, had been a prominent witness against raising ownership caps during last winter's Senate hearings, at which she laid out a specific and compelling case for how Clear Channel has become a near monopoly. Thomson and Toomey had once been minor rock stars together, as the indie group Tsunami, and Dilworth thought his marriage to Thomson was a simple instance of "rocker dude meets rocker chick." He said they didn't talk about politics. Dilworth himself had given lectures for FMC on the music business. ("Fuck the art," he had advised a conference of musicians. "Put the hit first.") Thomson, for her part, felt that her husband wasn't like the rest of Clear Channel.
One night, when Dilworth and I were in his office, he showed me his first gold record, awarded for a small role he had played in the success of the band Good Charlotte. A very small role, he said; gold records get passed around freely when a record company sees a future in a relationship.
"A down payment?" I said.
"Yeah, man, it's like, a favor for a favor."
"What's the difference between that and payola?"
Dilworth guffawed and looked at me like I was the dumbest kid in school. "It's all payola, dude." Then his shoulders slumped and he stopped laughing.
What determines the course of music today is not a zeitgeist or a paradigm or anything that can be dismissed simply as fashion. It's not even greed. What matters now is the process. "Cross-selling." "Clustering." A confluence of car radios and concert halls, the drinks at the bar, the ticket that gets you in the door, the beat you dance to. "Anything you can do to be associated with the music, you try to do," a Clear Channel executive with forty years in radio told me. This is not entirely sinister, nor is it especially new. The music business, in its varied forms, has always depended on symbiosis. Clear Channel wants you to identify with the brand so fully that you don't recognize it as a brand at all but rather as yourself. The executive gave me an example. "Suppose you like Dave Matthews," he said. "We like Dave Matthews. We have Dave Matthews together."
To achieve this mind-meld, Clear Channel has designed itself as a self-contained, nationwide feedback loop, calibrating the tastes of its listeners and segmenting them into market-proven "formats." Today, Clear Channel operates in thirteen major music formats, and although some of these formats are nearly indistinguishable, they are nevertheless finely tuned: for example, listeners can choose between "AC" (Adult Contemporary) and "Hot AC," or among "CHR" (Contemporary Hits Radio), "CHR Pop," and "CHR Rhythmic." John Hogan, the radio division's CEO, boasted that in 2003 the company would make more than 2 million phone calls to survey its listeners, a process that would produce "around 10,000 local-audience research reports."
As these reports are generated, the company can respond rapidly. "If we have a CHR PD" -- program director -- "in, you know, Dayton, Ohio, who figures out a great way to package up a bit, or a great promotion, or comes up with something clever and innovative, we can almost instantaneously make it available to CHR radio stations across the country." (At the time of our interview, Clear Channel owned eighty-nine CHRs.) Then, for a given advertiser, the company can align all its CHRs to hit one "formatic target" -- a demographic. Hogan suggested teenage girls. "A great advertiser would be the Crest Whitestrips. In the past, if Crest had wanted to use radio, they would have had to call a different owner in every market. There would have been no way to link together those stations with, you know, a common theme, or a common execution."
Such harmony extends to the company's concert business as well. "There's a lot of conference calling between cities," a booking agent named Tim Borror told me, "these former independents talking to one another, letting each other know what's going on." Another independent booking agent and a Clear Channel talent buyer, neither of whom would allow themselves to be named, confirmed this practice, adding that such calls take place almost on a weekly basis. The calls can launch a band or flatten it. "At a certain point, there's only one place to go -- Clear Channel -- and it doesn't matter whether or not they make you a fair offer," Borror said. "And pretty soon, they don't have to make you a fair offer. And they can decide what band is playing and what band isn't."
I asked John Hogan why I should believe that Clear Channel would never use its combined dominance of radio and live events to punish an artist -- or a politician -- who did not cooperate with the company. "I can't imagine a scenario where it would make any business sense at all," he replied. To use the power, he said, "would be to damage it." David T. "Boche" Viecelli, another booking agent, told me: "The thing people fear -- legitimately fear -- is that they're going to implement the threats they've intimated with radio airplay. It's not explicit. More often it's insinuation and innuendo."
Clear Channel doesn't have to actively be "the evil empire," because everyone knows that it could be. With so much of music and entertainment determined by, produced by, broadcast by, measured by, and defined by Clear Channel, the company need not exercise its control in order to wield it. Clear Channel is a system so pervasive that it relieves its participants-consumers, bands, employees, even executives-of the responsibility to object, and the ability to imagine why they would ever do so.
In Denver, Clear Channel owns half the rock stations on the dial, as well as the region's number-one station, the news/talk KOA. It owns the Fillmore, co-owns the Universal Lending Pavilion, controls the rights to the Pepsi Center, and in 2001 pried a sweetheart deal out of the city for booking shows at the legendary Red Rocks Amphitheatre, carved out of the stone of the Rocky Mountain foothills -- as much of a temple as pop music can claim.
I went to Denver to meet Jesse Morreale, an independent promoter who is suing Clear Channel. Morreale is one of the biggest independents in the country, but he is also one of the last. He persuaded one of the so-called Big Four law firms in Denver to represent him, but even if they can prove that Clear Channel Radio and Clear Channel Entertainment work together to shut out other promoters and threaten artists who work with them, there's a good chance his company, Nobody in Particular Presents, will be out of business by the time the case reaches any kind of conclusion. For now, Morreale has been silenced; Clear Channel won a protective order from the court, and although Morreale was happy to complain, he could not give me particulars.
Nor would the minor rock stars who came through town while I was there. The leather-clad lead singer of Cradle of Filth, a death-metal band from England, assured me that he would "never" say anything against Clear Channel. A punk-pop threesome called the Raveonettes at first said they hadn't heard of Clear Channel, then admitted that they had, then offered me a beer and asked if we couldn't please instead talk about rock-and-roll music. A record-company agent clinked shots with me and said, "Rock 'n roll!" but when Morreale told him I was writing about Clear Channel, he asked for my notes. "I'm going to need those," he said, trying to sound official. I would have said no, but since all I had written down was "Fred Durst," and the guy looked like he might cry, I tore the page out and gave it to him.
The next morning, I was driving around Denver listening to the radio when I heard a prerecorded spoof ad for "Butt Pirates of the Caribbean." It consisted mainly of the DJ reading, in a sneering lisp, a list of actors he considered "homo." Which is to say, it was nothing unusual. I had been listening to Clear Channel radio all over the country and had found that gay jokes ran second only to "camel jockey" or "towel head" humor. Such slurs, I began to think, were simply the comedic equivalent of the mannered rock "rebellion" in the musical rotation. Like the knee-jerk distortion of a Limp Bizkit song, the fag gags of the local morning crew are there to assure listeners that someone, somewhere, is being offended by what they are pretending to enjoy.
Back at my hotel, I called the local Clear Channel headquarters and asked for the man in charge, I was surprised to get a call back from Clear Channel's regional vice president, Lee Larsen, who invited me out to see him that very morning.
Larsen, who looked to be in his mid-fifties, was not a formal man. He put his loafers up on the coffee table between us and his arms behind his head and told me to fire away: he loved to talk about radio. Larsen wore his sandy hair in a modest pompadour, and although he had some girth on him, his tall frame and thick shoulders made him look like a linebacker. He started on the air forty years ago but made his career as a manager. On a pedestal near the center of his office sat an antique wooden radio, flanked by Broncos helmets facing inward. When I asked him what he listened to, he replied with a long and diverse list of stations -- none of them Clear Channel -- that marked him as a man of broad but refined tastes. Nevertheless, he was a staunch believer in Giving the People What They Want. "This whole society," he said, "is based on majority rules." There is no such thing, he said, as "lowest common denominator"; there is only democracy, and in the music world Clear Channel is its biggest purveyor. The best thing about democracy, which he likened to a pizza, is that there is so much of it. "If I take one slice of the audience, and it's the biggest slice, and it's the 'lowest common denominator' slice, whatever you want to call it, guess what? There's lots of slices for the other guy." As evidence of this bounty, he gestured over his shoulder. At first I thought he wanted me to look at the view of the Rockies behind him, but it turned out he was thinking of the franchise-lined highways I'd driven to get there. "Who'd have thought there could be so many different fast-food restaurants as there are?"
There were those among us, he said, who would complain nonetheless. People "at odds with the masses." People who believe that "the mass in our country are stupid." People who would tell you that you "should read Atlantic Monthly, not Time." But that was all right. "You can have anything you want," he said. "You just can't have what you want everywhere." He smiled. "Some people don't like that." He leaned forward and patted the coffee table, a little gesture to let me know that he knew that I knew what he was talking about, that I was, with him, part of "the mass."
I asked him about "Butt Pirates of the Caribbean." He reared back and looked at me like I was Tipper Gore. In a gentle, rumbling tone, he asked, "What are you saying? That it should not have been on?"
"Well . . . ," I said, "switch 'Butt Pirates of the Caribbean' for something like, say, 'Jigaboos of Jamaica,' and I think you can see what I mean."
Larsen frowned. "I know clearly that you couldn't do a bit like that, that's ethnic. I know that, okay? Maybe, in the area you're talking about, that might still be open. Society's still trying to figure out the line there. If you took that bit and put it on a classical-music radio station and played it, well the people would be outraged. It's out of context." But there was a time and place for such things. "If every radio station was doing 'Butt Pirates,' then you would be saying, 'Well, what is this?' But they are not." At the station I had heard it on, he explained, "the talent must have felt that was within the bounds they could work within, and was something that the audience that was listening to their radio station could relate to."
I must have looked unconvinced, because Larsen seemed worried. "On the radio," he said, "the red light's on and you're talking. And you say something. Just like you do in real life. And you go" -- he shaped his lips into an O and let his eyes bulge as he covered his mouth -- "I. Wish. I. Hadn't. Said. That." He shrugged his shoulders, held up his palms in a "what can you do?" gesture. "But it's too late."
From Denver, I went to Oklahoma City to meet with former congressman Julius Caesar "J. C." Watts, who had recently been named to Clear Channel's board of directors. During the hour and a half we spent driving around and listening to the radio in his shiny new black Cadillac Escalade, the congressman referred to Americans as "dogs" five times. Not in the slang sense -- Watts loathes what he calls that "hip-hop bebop rap" stuff -- but in the idiom of business. He was trying to get at what business is all about. He wasn't concerned about Clear Channel's overwhelming control of live music, he said, because "the dogs are eating the dog food." He said that the reason talk radio is so conservative is that "the dogs ain't eating the dog food" offered by liberals: "You can't force bad dog food on people!"
A former football star for the Sooners and a Southern Baptist preacher at a church called Sunnylane, Watts has an easy manner that can nevertheless be disconcerting, as when he took both hands off the wheel at 75 miles an hour, turned, and gripped my arm, saying, "I'm ready to go to the American people with my dog food." Then he found a song he seemed to like, "Get Busy," by Sean Paul, and turned it up. It was hip-hop, but it did have a spiritual message: "From the day we born Jah ignite me flame/Gal a call me name and it is me fame/It's all good girl turn me on/Till the early morn'/Let's get it on."
The former fourth-ranking Republican in the House, Watts may be out of office at the moment (he chose not to run last year), but at age forty-five he still wields considerable power as chair of GOPAC, an organization designed to develop Republican candidates at the state level, and as the G.O.P.'s great black hope. When President Bush made his recent tour of Africa, he tapped Watts as a traveling companion. When Democratic fixer Vernon Jordan retired from Clear Channel's board, he pushed Watts, a man who considers LBJ to have been a "wild-eyed radical," as his replacement.
But I don't think Watts's connections -- or his politics -- are why he "aligns nicely," as Clear Channel CEO Lowry Mays put it, with the company. Rather, I suspect it has something to do with his mix of aggressive amiability and angry defensiveness. Watts often gets called an "Uncle Tom"; Clear Channel's radio and concert guys are sick of being called "sellouts." Watts thinks it's unfair that as a black man he should have to defend himself for also being a Republican; Clear Channel can't understand why people seem shocked when it competes as fiercely as it does. Both Watts and Clear Channel look at what they're doing as revolutionary, unsentimental, necessary. Watts thinks Clear Channel simply needs to do a better job of telling the American people -- the dogs -- what the company is.
We pulled into the parking lot of a motel next to a Denny's. Watts said, "In politics or in business, you're either on the offense or you're on the defense. If you're on the defense, you're losing." Clear Channel, he explained, had to hit back, and hard. "Jeff, I think today that people are concerned with" -- he reached out and banged the dashboard speakers of his Escalade -- "this. They don't care where it's coming from!" Then he turned the radio on again and tuned it to his daughter's favorite station and cranked it up. "Get Busy," by Sean Paul.
"Same song!" Watts shouted. "Thirty minutes ago! I couldn't have planned that in a thousand years!" To Watts, this was a good thing.
He said Clear Channel needed a great slogan, like Fox's "Fair and Balanced."
"You mean," I said, "something like 'Clear Channel: We Give You What You Want.'"
"Yeah!" Watts slapped my shoulder. "Yeah! Or maybe . . ." He paused to think, then held up his hands to frame his idea. "Clear Channel, Your Community, you know, Involvement, you know, Network, or, or Station, or Whatever. . . . "An enemy says, 'Jeff, I don't want you to have what you have. You know, I'm gonna be a self-righteous income distributor. And I'm gonna balance this thing out.'" (Watts believes in balance, so long as it isn't, as he put it, "Communist," which, presumably, pre-1996 radio in America was.) "'And I'm gonna take from all those who're producing and give to those that aren't producing.'" He shook his head. "Uh-uh. When we get to the point where people are envious and we say, 'We're not gonna allow [consolidation] to happen'" -- Watts clapped a hand over mine and shuddered-"that is a fiendish business."
Regulation of radio ownership -- Watts's fiendish business -- is rooted in the idea that the spectrum is a national resource, but as a reality the "public airwaves" are close to extinct. Even proponents of regulation now fight for it, perversely, in the language of business, touting ownership caps as a means to preserve the "marketplace of ideas." This phrase, or even the "free market of ideas," has become a rhetorical fixture of anti-consolidation activists, for whom it connotes a free and fair system by which ideas compete for the minds of the citizenry. Implicit in the phrase is that ideas compete in roughly the same manner as do brands of soap; that, given equal price and placement, the most effective ideas will win the day. By owning so many stations, the argument goes, Clear Channel reduces the number of songs, sounds, formats, and opinions from which American listeners can choose.
But to so frame the argument is already to have lost. Media corporations want nothing more than to create new, popular formats with which to segment their audiences on advertisers' behalf. As advocates of deregulation never tire of pointing out, the "diversity" of U.S. radio content-in terms of average number of different formats available in each market-has increased with consolidation since 1996, not decreased. In fact, nothing resembles a "free market of ideas" so much as Clear Channel itself, where infinitesimal changes in ratings are tracked, mapped, and responded to; where Boston's successful new format can appear in San Diego overnight. This is what Lee Larsen means when he speaks of giving the people what they want. It is what J. C. Watts was trying to express when he jabbed the tuner on his radio and shouted, "This is democracy!" Clear Channel is a supermarket of ideas, which sells scores of different products all made in the same factory.
Activists fret that Clear Channel is foisting a right-wing agenda onto its listeners. To the contrary, the company seems to advance no ideology whatsoever; nor does it seem to advance any aesthetic that could be called good, bad, ugly, or beautiful. Perhaps the most instructive example here is the controversy over what has come to be called The List: the roster of songs that, immediately after September 11, were not supposed to be played on Clear Channel stations. The List's recommendations ranged from the obvious (AC/DC's "Shot Down in Flames") to the saccharine (Billy Joel's "Only the Good Die Young") to the grotesque (Van Halen's "Jump") to the unexpectedly poetic (Phil Collins's otherwise unremarkable "In the Air Tonight"). Antiwar activists pointed out that The List "banned" Cat Stevens's "Peace Train" and John Lennon's "Imagine," but ignored the fact that The List also proscribed Judas Priest's "Some Heads Are Gonna Roll" and the Clash's "Rock the Casbah," said to have been popular with U.S. pilots on bombing runs over Iraq during the first Gulf War.
Everyone seemed to see The List as the ultimate case of censorship by a corporate head office, but in fact The List came together just as might a great promotion by John Hogan's hypothetical program director in Dayton, Ohio. On his or her own initiative (nobody knows for certain where, or with whom, The List started), a Clear Channel PD drew up a list of songs; this PD emailed The List to a PD at another station, and he or she added more songs, and so on. When, eventually, The List was leaked to the press, Clear Channel pointed out that it was the work of independent program directors who were free to play -- or not to play -- whatever songs they liked.
Confusing The List for ideological censorship reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of the meaning of Clear Channel. It reflects the misguided notion that the company means anything at all. All the Clear Channel talent buyers, "on air personalities," news directors, and executives I spoke with shared a basic disregard for both the content of the product and its quality. The market would take care of those. Clear Channel's functionaries seemed to view the company as some marvelous but unfathomable machine with whose upkeep they had been charged. They knew only that it accomplished a miraculous task -- satisfying the musical tastes of most of the people -- and did not care to trouble themselves with how.
Bryan Dilworth swore to me he had nothing to do with Sean Agnew's show at the Church getting shut down. He said that any suggestion to the contrary was "Davy and Goliath bullshit." He claimed he walked into his boss's office and asked them if they had been involved. He told them he needed to know, because he would quit if they had. They swore innocence. I tried to confirm his story, but his bosses never returned my calls.
One Sunday I met Dilworth at his home in South Philly. His wife needed a nap, so we took his ten-month-old for a ride in his stroller. We walked through the Italian market, dead quiet at six on a Sunday evening, empty wooden stalls fronting pork shops and bakeries. We stopped to watch a group of boys on skateboards work a ramp they had set up in the street, performing for a video camera one of the kids was holding. Dilworth laughed. "The dudes who own those stores knew these kids were out here, skating on their stalls like that? They'd break their legs." This delighted him, all of it: the men who owned the stores who wouldn't give a damn for the law, the kids who took over the street who didn't give a damn for the owners. "This place is totally . . . this place," he said.
I asked him how that squared with his working for Clear Channel, which seemed dedicated to making every place the same. Dilworth didn't look at me but he smiled. His grin pushed his baby-fat cheeks up and made his eyes small.
"All of a sudden I'm supposed to be super-evil?" he said. "F**K THAT."
"No, that's not what I meant," I said.
"F**K THAT. I just wanted to make money doing something I liked. There are different opinions about how far down the road America is businesswise, but dude, whatever, it's too far gone for anything to change."
He bumped the stroller up over a curb, and the baby began to cry. We walked without talking for a few blocks, the clackety-clack of skateboard wheels fading behind us. But closer to home, both he and the baby mellowed. Dilworth stopped smiling, and his eyes stopped squinting.
"Then," he said, "there's that feeling in your spine, and it's all right." His voice went up in pitch and grew soft, as if he were embarrassed. He was talking about rock. "When the arc is just starting to arc? And you're saying this could be Van Halen, this could be Neil Young. It's like you're bearing witness. It's not, 'Ching-ching, here we go.' It's 'I saw it. It does exist.' There's something really there. It's not just a need for chaos. It's -- yeah. That's what I want." His voice deepened again, and his pace evened out. The baby had nodded off. We stopped in front of Dilworth's stoop. "Clear Channel?" he said. "That's money. I need it to buy liquor and baby clothes." (June 2005, Originally published in Harper's, Dec., 2003)


text:
What questions have inspired great legacies?
6 minute read 19 Jan 2016
Multidisciplinary professional services organization
Related topics Purpose Innovation
Some of the world's most lasting legacies have been created by people who looked at the world around them and asked: "Can this work better?"
What questions have inspired the creation of history's greatest legacies?
It may be impossible to know the minds of people long dead, but we can make an educated guess at the questions they posed themselves. Perhaps some may inspire you to ask questions of your own.
What question will you set out to answer?
Lived: Greece, 470–399 BC
His question: Can dialogue create better understanding?
On-going legacy: The father of Western philosophy and the theory of knowledge, and founder of the Socratic method, in which intelligent questioning leads to new understanding, the basis of almost all innovation and progress
Lived: Japan, c.978–1014
Her question: How can a story explain the human condition?
On-going legacy: Instrumental in popularizing the written Japanese language, her works became central to the development of Japanese society and culture
Lived: Italy, 1452–1519
His question: Does nature provide a blueprint for solving man's problems?
On-going legacy: Helped inspire the Renaissance, vastly advancing Western painting, sculpture and engineering and inspiring future generations of artists and scientists alike
Queen Elizabeth I of England
Lived: England, 1533–1603
Her question: How can I make my country safer and more prosperous?
On-going legacy: Began the first moves towards the British Empire, leading to English becoming one of the world's leading languages; inspirational female leader; increased role of parliament in government, leading to modern Western representative democracy
His question: How can stories tell a greater truth?
On-going legacy: The single most influential writer in Western literature, shaping modern storytelling; his contemporary popularity helped shape the structure and makeup of the modern English language
Queen Nzinga of Ndongo
Lived: Angola, 1583–1663
Her question: How can I protect my people?
On-going legacy: Helped spread Christianity to West Africa; by using diplomacy to counter early European colonialism and the slave trade, remains an inspiration to modern African leaders
His question: Can theory predict reality?
On-going legacy: Theory of gravity formed the basis of most developments in physics for three centuries; invented calculus, the basis of modern mathematical, scientific, economic and engineering modelling I
Lived: United States, 1706–1790
His question: Can I capture the power of the elements?
On-going legacy: As well as being a Founding Father of the United States, Franklin's experiments with electricity, meteorology and refrigeration directly led to many of our modern devices, from power lines to air conditioning
His question: Would a more equal society be more prosperous?
On-going legacy: As well as promoting equality and democracy and being credited with ending slavery in the US, Lincoln began the modernization of the US economy that helped it grow into the superpower it is today
Anandi Gopal Joshi
Lived: India, 1865–1887
Her question: Why can't a woman be a doctor?
On-going legacy: The first Indian woman and one of the first Indians to seek a Western medical education, she remains an inspiration to both women and people from the developing world to this day
Lived: The Netherlands and France, 1853–1890
His question: Can I paint the world as it feels, not just as it looks?
On-going legacy: Inspired much of the 20th century's radical new artistic movements; still one of the world's most popular (and expensive) artists; his life has also increased interest in and understanding of mental illness
His question: Why can't all men (and women) be treated equally?
On-going legacy: Fundamentally altered perceptions of the role of African-Americans and women in society, advancing democracy in the US and inspiring modern equality and civil rights movements across the globe
Her question: How can we bring flight to the masses?
On-going legacy: Not just the first woman or black woman to hold an international pilot's licence, but the first American; popularized the concept of commercial passenger aviation, helping create today's globally connected world
Sakichi Toyoda
Lived: Japan, 1867–1930
His question: Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?
On-going legacy: The father of modern management thinking, his "Five Whys" approach revolutionised trouble-shooting in the industrial age, driving efficiencies far beyond his own business
Lived: Poland and France, 1867–1934
Her question: Can we harness the power of things we can't see?
On-going legacy: Developed the first theory of radioactivity, leading to modern nuclear power; pioneered the use of X-rays to assess internal damage, and radiation to treat tumors, revolutionizing modern medicine
Lived: Austria and England, 1856–1939
His question: How can we heal a wounded mind?
On-going legacy: As the father of psychoanalysis, revolutionized understanding of the human mind and opened up the way to radically more effective treatments of mental illnesses.
His question: Can art shape a people's identity?
On-going legacy: Helped shaped modern Indian national identity both for Indians and non-Indians through his writing, poetry, plays, music and painting; inspired modernist writers across the globe
Lived: Croatia, Austria, Hungary, France & America, 1856–1943
His question: Does electricity need wires?
On-going legacy: Of around 300 patents granted in his lifetime, most around electricity, many are still being used and developed; his theories of wireless communication and electrical transmission led to the mobile phone, satellite communications and wireless internet
Questions have inspired some of history's greatest legacies.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Carl Bernstein Slams Media's '50/50′ Shutdown Coverage: 'This Is About The Republican Party' (VIDEO)
By Tom Kludt
October 8, 2013 3:45 a.m.
Longtime journalist Carl Bernstein on Tuesday called on the press to abandon the false equivalence that's colored much of the coverage of the government shutdown.
Appearing on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," the man who helped break the Watergate scandal said that the current budget impasse is not a two-sided matter.
"This is about the Republican Party and what it's going to be," Bernstein said. "Is it going to conduct a fact-based, philosophical argument in our political system or is it going to be a nihilistic, hateful, asymmetrical in terms of facts and the truth part of the party, as in Joe McCarthy?"
And with that in mind, Bernstein said that the press should cover the story accordingly.
"This is about media as well. These poll numbers are about a totally different media culture than we've had in the past…we need to start covering this story not 50/50 — this much on this side, that on the other — we need to cover it factually," Bernstein said. "Because there are facts here that will show what this event is about. And where, in fact, is this anger, hatred of Obama coming from? What is the root of this?"
Bernstein applauded the "Morning Joe" crew for highlighting a memo from House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), who echoed President Barack Obama in saying that Democrats have already made concessions by agreeing to funding the government at sequestration levels.
"It's about demagoguery and it needs to be viewed that way," Bernstein said. "What you just did on the air with that quote from Eric Cantor, every newspaper in America, The Wall Street Journal, ought to have it on the front page."
"It's about truth. It's about fact. It's about a wing in [the GOP] that has no interest in truth or governing or fact and it's bringing the country down," he continued. "It might not bring the party down. Like McCarthy, it might work. That's the terrible thing."
Tom Kludt (@TomKludt) Tom Kludt is a reporter for Talking Points Memo based in New York City, covering media and national affairs. Originally from South Dakota, Tom joined TPM as an intern in late-2011 and became a staff member during the 2012 election. He can be reached at tom@talkingpointsmemo.com.
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text:
'We began this revolution with Brexit' Farage claims Trump will do quick trades with UK
Nigel Farage says Donald Trump's victory is the first stage in a 'global revolution'
The former Ukip leader was in Washington DC for Mr Trump's inauguration, the next step in his extraordinary journey from fringe party leader to personal acquaintance of the most powerful person on earth.
On Thursday night, hosting a party at the five-star Hay-Adams Hotel opposite the White House, Mr Farage told cheering guests that Brexit was a rare moment when Britain had set the course for America to follow and not the other way around.
"I would like to think, in my own little way, that what we did with Brexit was the beginning of what is going to turn out to be a global revolution and that Trump's victory is a part of that," he told them.
Yesterday Mr Farage also hailed prospects for a swift post-Brexit trade deal, saying America's enthusiasm would strengthen Theresa May's hand in talks with the EU.
"What I saw with the Trump team were people who came from the private sector, where time is money, and they said 'We could get this done and dusted in 90 days'," he told Sky News.
"Now, whether it takes 90 days or 120 days isn't the issue. The point is that this new administration has a can-do attitude of people who are not public sector. They are not nine to five, they are people who will work 24/7 to get things done."
The former Ukip leader was in Washington DC for Mr Trump's inauguration
I would like to think, in my own little way, that what we did with Brexit was the beginning of what is going to turn out to be a global revolution
His closeness to the new President is yet another reason for the UK political establishment to loathe the cheeky Brexiteer-in-chief.
In mid-November, he became the first foreign politician to meet Mr Trump after his shock election win.
The photograph of the pair grinning in front of a glittering golden door at the President-elect's Trump Tower in New York became one of the iconic images of an extraordinary year.
Mr Farage revelled in the attention it brought him.
He capitalised on UK Government fury by offering to be a "bridge" between Mr Trump and London where he said the establishment had ignored the Republican in its certainty that Democrat Hillary Clinton would win.
A furious Downing Street let it be known that it wanted no truck with Mr Farage's go-between idea and ministers were reportedly banned from talking to him.
Mr Trump tweeted that Mr Farage would do a 'great job' as British ambassador to the US
Mr Trump joined the fun, tweeting that Mr Farage would do "a great job" as British ambassador to the US.
The adventures which propelled Mr Farage to near hero status among Trump backers began in earnest last July as the Brexit winner and friends decided to toast their triumph with a trip to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, which nominated Mr Trump as candidate.
Mr Farage was apparently quietly sounded out by a member of Team Trump but things took off when he and former Leave.
Donald Trump becomes 45th U.S. PRESIDENT
The inauguration of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States will mark the commencement of the four-year term of Donald Trump as President and Mike Pence as Vice President. A public ceremony will be held on Friday, January 20, 2017, on the West Front of the United States Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.
US President Donald Trump points to the stands as he walks with his wife Melania during the Inaugural Parade.
EU PR chief Andy Wigmore turned up in a Cleveland bar for a 4am last drink and the politician found himself feted by a gang of celebrating Republicans.
It led to an invitation to Mississippi in August to meet its Trump-backing Governor Phil Bryant, who invited Mr Farage to the inauguration.
According to Leave.
EU co-founder Arron Banks' memoir, The Bad Boys Of Brexit, Mr Trump had first greeted Mr Farage off stage with a bear hug and congratulations on "a great job on winning Brexit".
Mr Farage's closeness to controversial Mr Trump was strongly opposed by Ukip MEPs, particularly when the candidate's past comments about groping women came to light.
Mr Farage insisted he did have "reservations" about the Republican but told audiences if he had a vote he would not cast it for Mrs Clinton "if you paid me… in fact, if she paid me".
Mr Farage claims the new 'can-do' President will do a quick trade deal with Britain
The reservations subsided after Mr Trump's victory.
In November, fresh from a lecture in Florida, Mr Farage joined Mr Wigmore and Mr Banks in New York where they made a date to see Mr Farage's old friend and senior Trump adviser Steve Bannon.
A hoped-for phone call with Mr Trump became an hour-long meeting on the 58th floor and handshakes in front of that golden door.
Mr Farage now revels in his status of Trump-knower-in-chief. This week he told New York Magazine: "Our missions have been remarkably similar. Plus, we're the two most demonised people in the West!"
As Mr Trump was inaugurated, it emerged that MEP Mr Farage had cemented his celebrity status in America by becoming a "contributor", offering political analysis for Fox News cable channel and its sister Fox Business Network.
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text:
Home All The News Pep explains what Foden needs to do to succeed Silva at Man City
Pep explains what Foden needs to do to succeed Silva at Man City
Date published: Tuesday 10th December 2019 9:20
Pep Guardiola is confident Phil Foden can fill the boots of David Silva at Manchester City, and has revealed what he needs to improve to reach his level.
Foden, 19, is set for a rare start as City wrap up their Champions League Group C campaign against Dinamo Zagreb in Croatia.
Veteran playmaker Silva has not travelled due to injury but, as he has already announced he is to leave the club at the end of the season, it could be a foretaste of the future.
Foden has long been earmarked as the natural successor to Silva but he has had to wait patiently for his opportunities so far.
City boss Guardiola said: "That is our wish (that he can replace Silva). Of course David is a legend, with the amount of games and titles he has won, but it's our wish and we believe he can do it.
"He's growing from last season. There are still some departments he can improve. Sometimes he takes decisions with character and spirit because he is so young, but sometimes he has to think a bit more about decision-making, especially without the ball.
"But it's normal with his age. His development is perfect. We are more than satisfied with what he is doing with his training and when he plays."
City have nothing riding on the game in Croatia having already secured top spot in the group and their place in the last 16.
Defender Eric Garcia, 18, is another youngster set to be given an opportunity. City's problems at centre-back have continued with John Stones suffering a hamstring injury in the loss to Manchester United on Saturday and he is facing a spell out. Fernandinho is also suspended for the Dinamo clash.
Guardiola said: "The two young players are here but all the (rest of the) squad are here and we are going to put a better squad than fans were thinking.
"We are already qualified and the Premier League is more important than the Champions League right now, and we'll make some changes, but we will try to make a good result."
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Sit down to enjoy a delicious afternoon tea treat at the Ambassadors Hotel, for the first stop on this two-tiered indulgent experience. The afternoon tea spread includes sandwiches, fruit scones with cream and jam, cake and tea or coffee at the Ambassadors Hotel Number Twelve Restaurant. Relax, indulge and unwind before heading into the West End to watch a great show with top price seats. See a fantastic performance in either the stalls or the circle. Choose from Everybody is talking about Jamie, Mousetrap, The Play That Goes Wrong, Thriller Live, Wicked, The Woman in Black and Witness For the Prosecution.
Top price tickets to hit West End shows including: Everybody is talking about Jamie, Mousetrap, The Play That Goes Wrong, Thriller Live, Wicked, The Woman in Black and Witness For the Prosecution.
Available shows include: Everybody is talking about Jamie, Mousetrap, The Play That Goes Wrong, Thriller Live, Wicked, The Woman in Black and Witness For the Prosecution. Performances are available for selected midweek and weekend evenings and matinees, depending on show and subject to availability. Excludes School holidays, public and bank holidays. All dates are subject to availability.
Anyone over the age of five is welcome, but children must be accompanied by an adult at all times and sit quietly and unaided in their own seat. Most theatres can accommodate wheelchair users in specific areas (please advise at the point of booking).
Shows generally start between 7.30pm and 8pm and run for two to three hours. Afternoon tea can be taken at Number Twelve at the hotel from 2.30pm - 4pm.
Tickets are held at the theatre's pre-paid box office for collection half an hour before the show begins. Please be aware that shows and restaurants can be subject to change (for reasons beyond our control).


Nestled in the heart of the city, the picturesque cobblestone Skadarlija features traditional restaurants with live music, art galleries, and souvenir shops. Dating back to the 19th century, this was a Romani settlement at first, which later saw an arrival of craftspeople and caterers. Eventually it became the favorite spot of the city's artists and bohemians, with a continuous stream of entertainment and excellent cuisine. Take a walk along this old-world street, lined with rustic buildings and statues, and then duck into one of the restaurants to taste the region's most typical meals while listening to the sounds of brass or tamburica bands. It's best to wear comfortable shoes here, as the roads are bumpy. Using our world travel planner, Belgrade attractions like Skadarlija can form part of a personalized travel itinerary.
Earlier, the streets were covered with cobblestones. However, this is hardly anywhere to see. Almost any restaurant playing Serbian music.
It is a stone-paved Street, with many places to eat at noon or in the evening. They call it the Montmartre, but I do not agree much in comparison.
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Open Source Software (OSS) refers to software that is developed, tested, or improved through public collaboration and distributed with the idea that it must be shared with others, ensuring an open future collaboration.
The collaborative experience of many developers, especially those in the academic environment, in developing various versions of the UNIX operating system, Richard Stallman's idea of Free Software Foundation, and the desire of users to freely choose among a number of products - all of these led to the Open Source movement and the approach to developing and distributing programs as open source software.
Open source software is the fastest-growing field in the IT industry. Likewise, it is quickly becoming the most popular type of software and software platform for enterprises of all sizes. Its cost-effectiveness, lack of vendor limits and controls, flexibility, reliability and ease of use all make it the best option for most businesses, organizations – and even government agencies.
Globally, we are witnessing an exponential rise in the number of mobile devices being used. Open source technologies offers an effective way for mobile app development, mobile app development tools such as Ionic, PhoneGap, Titanium, Appium Framework7—idangero.us, Jquery mobile, Mobile Angular UI, React Native etc. are helping mobile app developers to create world-class mobile products, which are easy to deploy and can be scaled up easily.
Many of today's top new enterprise technologies are focusing on free, "open-source" technology. As a result, many big companies — from financial giants to retailers to services firms — are building their businesses around new, community-based technology that represents a sea change from the IT practices of the past.
At Innovision Technologies, we have built a strong and dedicated team of software professionals having in-depth experience in developing and deploying software solutions built using open source technologies. We provide development, implementation, consulting, technical support services for a wide range of open source technologies and products. Some of our successful business solutions are built using open source technologies, which have transformed our clients' software projects.


Created by Cheryl on Feb 11, 2009 10:32 AM. Last modified by Cheryl on Dec 2, 2016 10:25 AM.
DESCRIPTION: This document will help you get over the hurdle of understanding the Spanning-Tree protocol and its operation.


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A clean signal path with the highest quality possible.
The sound is fairly close to an API 512c, but less "mid-forward."
A great go-to vocal pre. Also great on overheads, drums, brass, bass (especially upright), and all acoustic instruments - fiddle, mandolin, dobro. Very nice build quality.


text:
Nation World News
Gardening, a new health promotion strategy
By Nation World News Desk
Physical inactivity or unhealthy diet have been known for years to be important modifiable risk factors for chronic diseases. Some studies suggest that these actions may be superior to nature-based community interventions. Thus, a test done by University of Boulder in Colorado (USA) concluded that community gardening (places where people farm collectively) can reduce these common health risks in a diverse adult population.
Funded by the American Cancer Society, this is the first randomized controlled trial of community gardening, which recruited people on waiting lists for community gardens in Denver and Aurora (USA) See the benefits of this activity for health.
Specifically, the analysis published in The Lancet Planetary Health looked at the effect of Community gardening on diet, physical activity and psychosocial outcomes in adults of varying ages, ethnicities and socioeconomic status and found that those who started gardening consumed more fiber and were more physically active, two known ways to reduce cancer and chronic disease risk. Similarly, it was observed that their level Significantly reduced stress and anxiety,
"These findings provide strong evidence that community gardening can play a role Important role in prevention of cancer, chronic diseases and mental health disorders," said the study's lead author, Jill LittProfessor in the Department of Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
The essay makes it clear that community garden interventions can be considered part of community strategies including nature-based social prescription Reduce risk factors for cancer and chronic diseases and, more broadly, to address health and wellness.
bridging the research gap
Jill Litt, who is also a researcher Barcelona Institute for Global Healthspent most of his career reduce the risk of diseaseespecially among low-income populations.
Gardening seemed like a perfect place to start, as he explained, "No matter where you go, people say there's something about gardening that makes them feel better".
However, solid science on its benefits is hard to find.
,Without evidence, it's hard to get support for new programs."
Various observational studies have found that people who cultivate gardens tend to eat more fruits and vegetables and have a healthier weight, But it was unclear whether gardening affects health and community gardening in particular because none of the studies focused on that area.
To fill the gap, Litt recruited 291 non-horticultural adults, average age 41, from the Denver area. More than a third were Hispanic and more than half came from low-income households.
After last spring frost, half was allocated community gardening group and the other half to the control group Who was asked to wait for a year to start gardening.
The gardening group received a free community garden plot, some seeds and plants, and an introductory gardening course through the non-profit Denver Urban Gardens program.
both groups surveyed them from time to time nutritional intake and mental health, In addition, they took body measurements and used equipment to monitor their activity.
increase fiber intake
In the fall, people in the gardening group ate an average of 1.4 grams more fiber per day than those in the control group, a an increase of about 7 percent.
The researchers noted that fiber serves a Profound effects on inflammatory and immune responsesWhich affects everything from how we metabolize food, how healthy our gut microbiome is, to how susceptible we are to diabetes or certain types of cancer.
while doctors advise around 25 to 38 grams of fiber per dayThe average adult consumes less than 16 grams.
"One gram of fiber can increase great positive effect on health", emphasizes James Hebert, director of the Cancer Control and Prevention Program at the University of South Carolina.
gardening group too their physical activity levels increased by about 42 minutes per week, Public health agencies recommend getting at least 150 minutes of physical activity a week, a recommendation met by only a quarter of the US population. With just two or three weekly visits to a community garden, participants met 28 percent of that requirement.
On the other hand, study participants also saw a reduction in their stress and anxiety levelsAnd people who entered the study more stressed and anxious showed a bigger reduction in their mental health problems.
The study also confirmed that even the most novice gardeners can Get Measurable Health Benefits In his first season with this activity. As they become more experienced and enjoy higher returns, Litt suspects these benefits will increase.
relationships flourish
Social connectivity also increases. And it's that as Litt explained, if you go to a garden to grow your own food in a cool place, relationships flourish Since you share technology with your plot neighbor as well as recipes and conversations.
"It's not just about fruits and vegetables. It's also about being in a natural outdoor space with others"
To conclude, Lit highlights that It is hoped the study's findings will encourage health professionals and politicians Seek community gardens and other places that encourage people to come together in nature as an important part of the public health system. And the proof is clear.
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text:
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <ctype.h>

#include <stm32f4xx_hal.h>

#include "main.h"
#include "ff.h"

#include "defs.h"
#include "delay.h"
#include "leds.h"
#include "byte_queue.h"
#include "gpio_helpers.h"
#include "utility.h"
#include "logprintf.h"

#include "sd_spi.h"

#include "monitor_queue.h"
#include "uart.h"

void panic_worse()
{
    LED_set_panic(1);
    for(;;);
}

void panic(void)
{
    static int entered = 0;

    LED_set_panic(1);

    int pin = 0;
    for(;;) {
        if(!entered) {
            // SERIAL_flush() can itself panic(), so stop reentry here
            entered = 1;
            SERIAL_flush();
            entered = 0;
        }

        LED_set_panic(pin);
        pin = pin ? 0 : 1;
        delay_ms(100);
    }
}

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------
// System Initialization Goop

static void SystemClock_Config(void)
{
  RCC_ClkInitTypeDef RCC_ClkInitStruct;
  RCC_OscInitTypeDef RCC_OscInitStruct;

  /* Enable Power Control clock */
  __HAL_RCC_PWR_CLK_ENABLE();

  /* The voltage scaling allows optimizing the power consumption when the device is
     clocked below the maximum system frequency, to update the voltage scaling value
     regarding system frequency refer to product datasheet.  */
  __HAL_PWR_VOLTAGESCALING_CONFIG(PWR_REGULATOR_VOLTAGE_SCALE2);

  RCC_OscInitStruct.OscillatorType = RCC_OSCILLATORTYPE_LSI|RCC_OSCILLATORTYPE_HSE;
  RCC_OscInitStruct.HSEState = RCC_HSE_ON;
  RCC_OscInitStruct.LSIState = RCC_LSI_ON;
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLState = RCC_PLL_ON;
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLSource = RCC_PLLSOURCE_HSE;
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLM = 16; // Divide HSE by this
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLN = 336; // Then multiply by this
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLP = RCC_PLLP_DIV2; // Then divide by this
  RCC_OscInitStruct.PLL.PLLQ = 7; // Divide by this for SD, USB OTG FS, and some other peripherals
  if(HAL_RCC_OscConfig(&RCC_OscInitStruct) != HAL_OK)
  {
    panic();
  }

  RCC_ClkInitStruct.ClockType = RCC_CLOCKTYPE_SYSCLK | RCC_CLOCKTYPE_PCLK1 | RCC_CLOCKTYPE_PCLK2;
  RCC_ClkInitStruct.SYSCLKSource = RCC_SYSCLKSOURCE_PLLCLK;
  RCC_ClkInitStruct.AHBCLKDivider = RCC_SYSCLK_DIV1;
  RCC_ClkInitStruct.APB1CLKDivider = RCC_HCLK_DIV4; // APB1 will be 42MHz
  RCC_ClkInitStruct.APB2CLKDivider = RCC_HCLK_DIV2; // APB2 will be 84MHz
  // grantham - 5 cycles for 168MHz is stated in Table 10 in the STM32F4 reference manual
  if(HAL_RCC_ClockConfig(&RCC_ClkInitStruct, FLASH_LATENCY_5) != HAL_OK)
  {
    panic();
  }
}

void system_init()
{
    HAL_Init();

    SystemClock_Config();

    __HAL_RCC_GPIOA_CLK_ENABLE();
    __HAL_RCC_GPIOB_CLK_ENABLE();
    __HAL_RCC_GPIOC_CLK_ENABLE();
    __HAL_RCC_GPIOD_CLK_ENABLE();

    delay_init();
}

/*--------------------------------------------------------------------------*/
/* USB ---------------------------------------------------------------------*/

#if 0
USBD_HandleTypeDef USBD_Device;

void USB_init()
{
    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    // Enable TIM peripherals Clock
    TIMx_CLK_ENABLE();

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    // Configure the NVIC for TIMx
    /* Set Interrupt Group Priority */
    HAL_NVIC_SetPriority(TIMx_IRQn, 6, 0);

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    /* Enable the TIMx global Interrupt */
    HAL_NVIC_EnableIRQ(TIMx_IRQn);

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    /* Init Device Library */
    USBD_Init(&USBD_Device, &VCP_Desc, 0);

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    /* Add Supported Class */
    USBD_RegisterClass(&USBD_Device, USBD_CDC_CLASS);

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    /* Add CDC Interface Class */
    USBD_CDC_RegisterInterface(&USBD_Device, &USBD_CDC_fops);

    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
    /* Start Device Process */
    USBD_Start(&USBD_Device);
    printf("%s, line %d\n", __FILE__, __LINE__); SERIAL_flush();
}

#endif

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------
// stdio

#define OUTPUT_TO_SERIAL        0x01
#define OUTPUT_TO_VIDEO         0x02

int gOutputDevices = OUTPUT_TO_SERIAL;

void __io_putchar( char c )
{
    if(gOutputDevices & OUTPUT_TO_SERIAL)
        SERIAL_enqueue_one_char(c);
    if(gOutputDevices & OUTPUT_TO_VIDEO) {
        // XXX on-screen video output
    }
}

void errorchar(char c)
{
    SERIAL_enqueue_one_char(c);
    // XXX on-screen video output
}

void errorchar_flush()
{
    SERIAL_flush();
}

char gMonitorCommandLine[80];
unsigned char gMonitorCommandLineLength = 0;

void usage()
{
    printf("help       - this help message\n");
    printf("debug N    - set debug level\n");
    printf("panic      - force panic\n");
}

int go = 0;

void process_local_key(unsigned char c)
{
    // XXX make this table driven, break into lots smaller functions
    if(c == '\r' || c == '\n') {
        putchar('\n');
        gMonitorCommandLine[gMonitorCommandLineLength] = 0;

        if((strcmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "help") == 0) ||
           (strcmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "h") == 0) ||
           (strcmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "?") == 0)) {

            usage();

        } else if(strcmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "go") == 0) {

            MAIN();

        } else if(strcmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "panic") == 0) {

            printf("panicking now\n");
            panic();

        } else if(strncmp(gMonitorCommandLine, "debug ", 6) == 0) {

            char *p = gMonitorCommandLine + 5;
            while(*p == ' ')
                p++;
            gDebugLevel = strtol(p, NULL, 0);
            printf("Debug level set to %d\n", gDebugLevel);

        } else {

            printf("Unknown command.\n");
            usage();
        }

        printf("* ");
        gMonitorCommandLineLength = 0;

    } else {

        if(c == 127 || c == '\b') {
            if(gMonitorCommandLineLength > 0) {
                putchar('\b');
                putchar(' ');
                putchar('\b');
                gMonitorCommandLineLength--;
            } else {
                bell();
            }
        } else {
            if(gMonitorCommandLineLength < sizeof(gMonitorCommandLine) - 1) {
                putchar(c);
                gMonitorCommandLine[gMonitorCommandLineLength++] = c;
            } else {
                bell();
            }
        }
    }
}

void process_monitor_queue()
{
    unsigned char isEmpty = queue_isempty(&mon_queue.q);

    if(!isEmpty) {
        unsigned char c = queue_deq(&mon_queue.q);
        process_local_key(c);
    }
}

void uart_received(char c)
{
    queue_enq(&mon_queue.q, c);
}

#define Var_BB(VarAddr, BitNumber) (((int)PERIPH_BB_BASE | (((int)VarAddr - (int)PERIPH_BASE) << 5) | ((BitNumber) << 2)))

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------
// libgl connection

FIL capture_file;

uint8_t receive_uint8()
{
}

#define BUFFER_SIZE 1024
uint8_t buffer[BUFFER_SIZE];
uint8_t buffer_count = 0;

static void write_buffer()
{
    if(buffer_count == 0)
        return;

    UINT waswritten;
    FRESULT result = f_write(&capture_file, &buffer, BUFFER_SIZE, &waswritten);
    if(result != FR_OK) {
        logprintf(DEBUG_ERRORS, "ERROR: couldn't write buffer to capture file\n");
        panic();
    }
    if(waswritten != BUFFER_SIZE) {
        logprintf(DEBUG_ERRORS, "ERROR: tried to write %ld bytes, wrote %ld bytes\n", BUFFER_SIZE, waswritten);
        panic();
    }
    buffer_count = 0;
}

void send_uint8(uint8_t b)
{
    LED_beat_heart();
#if 0
    buffer[buffer_count++] = b;

    if(buffer_count == BUFFER_SIZE) {
        SERIAL_enqueue_one_char('.'); SERIAL_flush();
        write_buffer();
    }
#endif
}

int count = 0;
void flush()
{
    printf("frame %d\n", count); SERIAL_flush();
    if(++count > 60) {
        write_buffer();
        f_close(&capture_file);
        f_mount(NULL, "0:", 1);
        printf("finished capturing\n"); SERIAL_flush();
        panic();
    }
}

void open_connection()
{
}

//----------------------------------------------------------------------------
// main

FATFS gFATVolume;

int main()
{
    system_init();

    LED_init();
    LED_beat_heart();

    MON_init();
    LED_beat_heart();

    setbuf(stdout, NULL);

    SERIAL_init(); // transmit and receive but global interrupts disabled
    LED_beat_heart();

    printf("\n\nAlice 4 CPU\n");
    printf("System core clock: %lu MHz\n", SystemCoreClock / 1000000);

    LED_beat_heart();
    SERIAL_flush();

    if(1) {
        SPI_config_for_sd();
        LED_beat_heart();

        if(!SDCARD_init())
            printf("Failed to start access to SD cardSPI!!\n");
        else
            printf("Opened SD Card\n");
        LED_beat_heart();
        SERIAL_flush();

        FRESULT result = f_mount(&gFATVolume, "0:", 1);
        if(result != FR_OK) {
            logprintf(DEBUG_ERRORS, "ERROR: FATFS mount result is %d\n", result);
            panic();
        } else {
            printf("Mounted FATFS from SD card successfully.\n");
        }
        SERIAL_flush();

        result = f_open (&capture_file, "logo.cap", FA_WRITE | FA_CREATE_ALWAYS);

        if(result != FR_OK) {
            logprintf(DEBUG_ERRORS, "ERROR: couldn't open \"logo.capture\" for writing, FatFS result %d\n", result);
            panic();
        }

    }
    // USB_init();

    printf("* ");
    SERIAL_flush();

    while(!go) {
        int key;

        SERIAL_try_to_transmit_buffers();
        LED_beat_heart();

        SERIAL_poll_continue();

        process_monitor_queue();
    }

    // should not reach
    panic();
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


The Spoken English Online Course is a very basic course and can be understood easily by non-English speakers especially Indians. The trainers and instructors are well versed with Spoken English and are trained to share their knowledge with all the candidates that participate in our Spoken English Online Training. Being an online course, you get several added benefits such as studying at your will and convenience and easy solutions of your doubts.
Communication is the basis for all kinds of relation made in the world. Man is a social animal and hence proper communication becomes inevitable. English is the most commonly used languages around the globe. It is one of the most recognized official language, the knowledge of which could open a gateway of opportunities for a person. We at GangBoard understand the language's importance and so we bring to you this Spoken English class that guarantees excellence in the language.
Why Spoken English Online Course?
Why would anybody want to learn how to speak English? How does spoken English benefit you? Is it necessary that you know how to speak English fluently? If you are someone who has such questions, we will answer them all here. Fluency in the English language is seen as a sign of virtue and high literacy. As wrong as that sounds, it really is the truth. Knowing how to speak English fluently will help you boost your confidence and help you gel along with people who hold high posts.
Most of the jobs have a prerequisite of spoken English nowadays, so the knowledge of this language could also mean the difference between getting a job or staying unemployed. We know how difficult it is for a person to make time and go to a certain class only to learn a new language and for that reason, we have the Spoken English online course . You could think that you would attend a regular spoken English class near me, but then the Spoken English class asks you to stay committed every day. If you miss any classes you will be left behind in the course and it will eventually be an inefficient way of learning the language. Hence we suggest you take up the Spoken English classes online at GangBoard instead of the regular spoken English class and start speaking fluent English in no time.
The Spoken English online course at GangBoard is one of the best Spoken English classes online. This is because of the fact that we have an excellent team of trainers and instructors who are fluent English speakers. They understand the struggle very well and hence can empathize with most candidates that attend our Spoken English online course . The course that is prepared for the participants at our Spoken English class is designed in a way that it increases gradually in levels, hence helping them grab on to the basics in a better manner.
The Spoken English online course will help you understand the English language in a much efficient manner compared to conventional spoken English classes.
You will be tested with your speaking skills by allowing you to participate in real life conversations so that it will increase your confidence with the Spoken English online course.
The Spoken English classes online will help you convert all those important job interviews.
You will be able to communicate with the global audience which may help you extend your business and increase your profit.
Knowing how to speak English means you know how to listen and hence gain more understanding and knowledge of the world around you.
If you are a frequent traveler, our Spoken English online course will help you speak English at your convenience.
A whole new world of English movies and books will be opened to you once you become fluent with the language and it won't take much time with our Spoken English class.
What is the objective of our Spoken English Online Course?
The main objective of our spoken English Online Training is to help the candidates speak fluent English.
Make the least amount of grammatical mistakes while speaking.
Proper articulation of words and sentences.
Better use of most common English words and complete sentence formation.
Preparing candidates for job interviews, mock rounds, and group discussion.
Why should you go for the Spoken English online Course?
If you are someone looking for a job then proficiency in the English language will give you a better chance of landing the job than the actual skills required for the job. If you are someone who is looking to study or work abroad then the knowledge about the English language will prove to be an asset for you, it is also a compulsory condition to move to certain countries. One must know how to speak English fluently in general as it seems to increase one's confidence and value among peers. The benefits of Spoken English are a lot, start your journey with our spoken English class today!
The Spoken English Online Training at GangBoard is sketched into three levels. This is done in order to make the students feel comfortable with the basics and consolidate the foundation and then to move onto more advanced spoken English concepts if they wish to. The Beginner and Intermediate level classes will benefit most students while the advanced level classes are designed for candidates looking for better proficiency over the skills they already possess. The three levels offered at our spoken English class are as follows.
This course is designed for entry-level students with a negligible understanding of the English language. With our Beginner level course, the candidate will be able to talk about his or her life in basic terms. They will understand basic expressions and can converse with a slow pace of speaking. The candidate would be able to talk about quantities, use adjectives, order food in a restaurant, and so on. They will comfortably talk about familiar situations in their life.
The Intermediate level of the Spoken English class is beneficiary for candidates who understand the importance of basic grammar and find difficulty in explaining themselves. After our Intermediate spoken English class, the candidates will speak English with a fluency that can be understood without any difficulties. They can talk about real life decisions and plans and will feel comfortable in almost all situations.
The candidates opting for our Advanced Spoken English class would be able to use English in social life situations and interact with people with proficiency comparable to native English speakers. They can use the language at will for all situations after completing our Advanced spoken English class course.


April Showers bring May Flowers...and Graduations. I thought I would share a graduation cake that you will have plenty of time to make for your upcoming graduate.
Would you believe it's a cake roll?
Quite fitting for a rolled diploma don't you think?
Just wrap it in fondant and you'll have the perfect sweet to hand out at the end of the ceremony.
Start by making the Cake Log following the instructions HERE.
After you've made the cake, wrap in saran and freeze until you're ready to wrap.
Roll white Wilton fondant, cutting to size to fit the cake roll.
Cut the numbers 2014, a long strip and a bow out of red Wilton fondant.
I used a bow cutter and formed the loops with paint brush handles.
After wrapping the cake roll in white fondant, lay the long red strip across the serving plate.
Place the diploma cake on the red strip and wrap the strip around the cake.
Seal with a little glue (water).
Add the bow and the numbers.
Isn't it time you put a little Pomp in your Circumstance?
Thanks Beth! Rolling is MUCH easier then covering, now I'll want to make all my cakes into logs!
Ha ha, I think I like it better then mine too!
This is the cutest graduation cake I've ever seen! So cute. Another wonderful creation!
Aww, you're so sweet, thanks for the comment!
First time I've seen this type of graduation cake. Wonderful idea, I love it!
Thank you Paula, I'm happy you love it!
Looks so clean and gorgeous! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you Laurie - I'll have to get busy and up load more to the Tip Junkie craft room! Thanks for the "TIP"!


Dianne is a speaker and trainer that challenges leaders and individuals to discover their own personal greatness and dare to 'step' into their unique leadership style.
Dianne is a visionary who sees business and life through new eyes. She sees what could be when the rest of the world doesn't see the possibility. Dianne presents that vision to the client with enthusiasm and business savvy. She is able to identify training needs by asking questions that go beyond the scope of the original vision. She asks questions to get answers that the client hasn't even thought of yet!
Her execution and delivery of training material is excellent. Dianne is engaging as a trainer and speaker, keeping her audience entertained as well as relaying relevant and important information. She encourages her students to not just learn, but to grasp, hold on and utilize what they learned in her class. Her positive attitude and personality beams.
Dianne has the skills and aptitude to help your organization be successful. As Training Director. Dianne came into the organization revamping the training program, starting new training programs, and increasing enthusiasm organization wide through her initiatives. She could be relied on for creative ideas and solutions.
Dianne is bright and personable, highly self-motivated and well capable of achieving any goal she sets her mind to.
Dianne has the rare ability to engage the audience and get them fully involved and present. As a result, the people she facilitates become more creative, solve difficult problems and grow in the process. As a seasoned executive and a founder and Sr. VP of FedEx for their first 10 years, I have worked with hundreds of facilitators, trainers and presenters. I rank Dianne on the top of the list because of her unique ability to quickly relate to the audience and get them to have fun solving often very difficult team and individual growth issues.
Dianne is an inspiration; she always takes the extra steps. Her guidance pushed me to strive for more than, just enough. She easily finds uniqueness in each person and connects at the level needed. Dianne taught me well and inspire me.
Hover over testimonial to pause transition.
Challenging intentional learners to discover their own personal greatness and dare to 'step forward' into their amazing gifts; aligning talents, strengths, personality style, values and vision to life, love, and work.
has an overwhelming ability to connect content to real life stories. Dianne quickly engages audiences and moves them to laughter, connectedness and next steps.
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Discussion in 'Bride World Wide & Grooms Grooves' started by sonyachancs, Nov 23, 2014.
it's about a year and a half before the wedding (we think, though we'll give it up to 2ish years), and we're trying to think about what we want.
3. HUGE banquet dinner with about 300-400 people.
3. we want a small dinner with close friends and immediate family, with about 85-100 people.
so I was wondering, of the rest of you unencumbered by church or asian traditions, what did you do for your wedding?
I see loads of gorgeous photos of american/ european weddings, but what actually goes on!
I too am Chinese and got married only a few months ago.
We got married on the coast of Spain (though we are in Canada) in an 18th century converted theatre turned boutique hotel… it kept the wedding very intimate (35 people), unique and so beautiful! The setting was incredible… medieval towns and amazing country-side and coastal villages.
It definitely requires much more coordination and work, but I would suggest considering a destination wedding. If an all-inclusive wedding package (e.g. caribbean) is not your cup-of-tea, consider one in Europe?
The one disadvantage to consider is that we still had to come home and have a "chinese banquet" for all the family friends who couldn't make it to Spain… but we didn't spend too much time or effort making that one special (in fact, I gave the reigns to my mother completely, and it was really more of a dinner in a restaurant).
Hey I am not a Chinese but my girlfriend belongs to China. I attended some Chinese wedding events in New York with her. Their traditions and cultures are quite different and she always asks me to get married in Chinese style.
Do your number 3. What is the big deal? Your wedding...your choice.
I did not realize being Chinese was "encumbered".
Changing the name? I've so tired from this! My friend got married last month, I making the decision was really hard for her. But now it seems to be okay. This how to change your name resource was really helpful. If you, girls, have the same problem just click the link, it really would save your time. Very nicely written and inspiring.


text:
Centre for Heart Lung InnovationCentre for Heart Lung Innovation Logo
Support HLI
NewsDr. Tillie-Louise Hackett Awarded Tier 1 Canada Research Chair
Congratulations to Dr. Tillie-Louse Hackett who was awarded a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Asthma and COPD Lung Pathobiology & Therapeutics and Canadian Foundation for Innovation Funding for Single Cell Imaging Research.
In Canada, over 5.8 million people have asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) that make it challenging every day to breathe. These diseases currently have no cure.
Dr. Tillie Hackett's research uses ultra-resolution imaging to identify lung disease at its earliest stages that cannot be detected using current clinical tests, to define the cellular and molecular alterations responsible for the disease pathobiology. This research will enable a better understanding of how these lung diseases develop, providing new approaches for prediction and diagnosis, resulting in new treatments to improve the lives of asthma and COPD patients.
Tillie Hackett
https://research.ubc.ca/fifteen-new-and-renewed-ubc-canada-research-chairs-announced
https://www.canada.ca/en/innovation-science-economic-development/news/2021/06/government-of-canada-makes-major-investment-in-canadian-science-research-and-engineering.html
https://www.chairs-chaires.gc.ca/media-medias/lists-listes/2021/june-juin-eng.aspx
New MRI Imaging Core at HLI
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Access to teacher guides provides users with activity guides, tips, and video examples of activities. The teacher's guides are a paid feature of the Exploring Our Fluid Earth site with new updates added regularly.
Payment is one-time only (no subscription fees). Upgrade your membership to paid status now!