CEO Jack Dorsey asked Twitter users what improvements they most wanted to see, and as you'd expect, he got an avalanche of replies -- over 5,700 so far. The most requested feature was the ability to edit tweets after you've sent them, rather than having to delete and start again. Dorsey agreed that "a form of edit is def needed," and that the company is "thinking a lot about it." However, he thinks anything beyond quick edits would require a changelog, and some users suggested any edits would worsen trust issues with the site.
Dorsey suggested that there are two types of edits Twitter could implement. The first would allow a window, say five minutes, to fix any typos, bad links and other user errors. The other would allow you to make edits anytime, much as you can on Facebook. However, as with Facebook, Twitter would be forced to implement a revision history in that case so that edits don't go "off the public record," Dorsey said.
— jack (@jack) December 29, 2016CEO Jack Dorsey asked Twitter users what improvements they most wanted to see, and as you'd expect, he got an avalanche of replies -- over 5,700 so far. The most requested feature was the ability to edit tweets after you've sent them, rather than having to delete and start again. Dorsey agreed that "a form of edit is def needed," and that the company is "thinking a lot about it." However, he thinks anything beyond quick edits would require a changelog, and some users suggested any edits would worsen trust issues with the site.
Dorsey suggested that there are two types of edits Twitter could implement. The first would allow a window, say five minutes, to fix any typos, bad links and other user errors. The other would allow you to make edits anytime, much as you can on Facebook. However, as with Facebook, Twitter would be forced to implement a revision history in that case so that edits don't go "off the public record," Dorsey said.
— jack (@jack) December 29, 2016
It might even allow a short window to edit that could further damage trust in the network. By altering tweets, news sites or prominent individuals could slightly changing their context and meaning, for instance. President-elect Trump, for one, considers the site as his own personal "newspaper -- without the losses," he once tweeted. While it's clear when he deletes tweets, many users might not notice if one has been slightly altered.
"Delete is enough. Context changing post-fact is dangerous," user Justyn Howard replied to Dorsey. He added that even short edit windows between 30 seconds and five minutes aren't really needed, since you can just delete and repost a tweet. As for a revision history, he points out that "80 people liked [your tweet]. Which version?"
— Justyn Howard (@Justyn) December 29, 2016
Other top suggestions were to introduce bookmarks so you could find favorite tweets easier, rather than just using the "like" button, which also effectively endorses the tweet. The other main demand, of course, was to improve safety and reporting options for bullies, something Twitter has been taken to task for many times. In replying to many of those requests, Dorsey called it the company's "top priority."
Twitter is already looking or has previously looked at a lot of the ideas, Dorsey said, and that's the rub of the problem with Twitter in general. It's stuck between pleasing its existing users and trying to attract new ones to a site that's notoriously difficult to grok and potentially dangerous once you get popular. Dorsey was perhaps hoping to see a genius idea that could solve all those problems and finally help make the site profitable -- or saleable.
Showing posts with label mortgage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mortgage. Show all posts
Friday, December 30, 2016
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
IOS 8 Breakdown
With almost two weeks of the IOS 8 the problems have already raised. Some users of the latest IOS have complains that the IOS limits the use of calls and other messaging systems. Apple is working on the problem, IOS 8 is still available for upgrading on the store though.
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Scots prepare for independence vote
He looks just like many would imagine the typical Scot. Kilt, knee-high socks, bagpipes and a solid build. People stand and clap when John Patterson plays Highland melodies near Edinburgh Castle. In the emotional question of Scottish independence, Patterson has answered questions for one local TV station after another. "There is a lot of tension in the air," he said. "People want to see emotions."
He added that he doesn't have a firm view on Scottish independence. But - as a New Zealander - he's not allowed to vote anyway, and instead chuckles with amusement when people regard him as a typical Scot. After all, he said, there are only two types of people: "Scots and the people who wish they were Scots."
Audry Painsarnault came to Scotland with her husband and four children to hang up "no" posters and stickers around the city and to try and convince people to keep Scotland in the United Kingdom. Like Patterson, she won't be able to vote in Thursday's referendum. "My husband has Scottish ancestry so we decided if we could do some small part in all this then we would," she said. "We came with our four children to help. We want to convince people to vote - no matter what their opinions are." She added that in Canada there is a similar movement for independence among French-speaking Canadians in Quebec.
Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister and head of the Scottish National Party, laid out a clear definition. Anyone who lives in Scotland is a Scot and can vote on the question of whether to leave the United Kingdom after more than 300 years and become an independent nation. The three latest polls show the "yes" and "no" camps nearly neck-and-neck with those opposed to independence leading with 52 percent to 48 percent, though the polls do not take the eight percent of undecided voters into account.
Ben Walker is a businessman from London who said he sees himself as a Scot and wants his home to stay in the UK with England, Wales and Northern Ireland. He regrets that he, like 800,000 other Scots living outside of Scotland, does not have a vote. "All Scots who live in England are not, under the terms of the referendum, allowed to vote." Walker said. "I would become a foreigner without having a say on it."
Campaigning in the final days leading up to the referendum has heated up, with Scottish nationalists saying they wanted to free themselves from oppression and dismissing offers of more regional autonomy as untrustworthy. Unionists then accused the nationalists of lying. Pro-British Labour Party leader Ed Miliband was even attacked during a campaign event in Edinburgh. The British tabloid press managed to dig out a few final scandals. The Scottish Daily Mail accused Salmond of megalomania for proposing that a new position be created after independence.
Claims that Scots were about to take their fate in their hands at the ballot box were made by both sides on the final day of campaigning.
"I think the emotional side is nice - I'm a Scot, I was educated here," he said. "I care quite passionately about my country. But I think from the rational side it is something we cannot afford. We are wandering into an abyss and I think we are going to be much worse off."
The economic effects would be disastrous, he said, adding: "Why would you break up one of the most successful states? The UK is not perfect, and it has the same problems as Germany or France or America or any Western democracy and independence and rampant nationalism isn't the way to solve that."
A few blocks further down the streets at the "Yes" campaign office, Rachel Blair has a different take. She said Scotland's oil reserves would bolster the country's economy.
"At the moment we have a government in London that people in Scotland feel quite disconnected from," she said. "We need a government that is closer to home and more accountable to the Scottish people. I think we have got a lot of problems here. We have one in five children in poverty, families queuing up at food banks. We need to be in control of our own resources to address these issues."
Those for and against independence disagree on whether Scotland would remain in the European Union and keep the pound as its currency. But charges that Scotland would be left on its own are just fear-mongering, Blair said.
A number of trade and industry groups have warned against independence. Unions are split on the issue. The British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, spends her summers in Scotland but has not taken a clear position on the referendum, saying only that the voters should consider the consequences of their choice. Regardless of the poll's outcome, most nationalists say they want the queen to remain their head of state.
Polls will close at 10 pm local time and results from the vote are expected in the early hours of Friday. Some pubs in Edinburgh have had closing times lifted so people can congregate and hear the results. Some nationalists have even already setup a border checkpoint between Scotland and England - one that looked so real some drivers actually stopped and handed over their papers.
"I'm not for or against independence, " Jon Parker Lee of Manchester said after passing the faux-checkpoint. "I just want everyone to have a good laugh."
He added that he doesn't have a firm view on Scottish independence. But - as a New Zealander - he's not allowed to vote anyway, and instead chuckles with amusement when people regard him as a typical Scot. After all, he said, there are only two types of people: "Scots and the people who wish they were Scots."
Audry Painsarnault came to Scotland with her husband and four children to hang up "no" posters and stickers around the city and to try and convince people to keep Scotland in the United Kingdom. Like Patterson, she won't be able to vote in Thursday's referendum. "My husband has Scottish ancestry so we decided if we could do some small part in all this then we would," she said. "We came with our four children to help. We want to convince people to vote - no matter what their opinions are." She added that in Canada there is a similar movement for independence among French-speaking Canadians in Quebec.
Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister and head of the Scottish National Party, laid out a clear definition. Anyone who lives in Scotland is a Scot and can vote on the question of whether to leave the United Kingdom after more than 300 years and become an independent nation. The three latest polls show the "yes" and "no" camps nearly neck-and-neck with those opposed to independence leading with 52 percent to 48 percent, though the polls do not take the eight percent of undecided voters into account.
Ben Walker is a businessman from London who said he sees himself as a Scot and wants his home to stay in the UK with England, Wales and Northern Ireland. He regrets that he, like 800,000 other Scots living outside of Scotland, does not have a vote. "All Scots who live in England are not, under the terms of the referendum, allowed to vote." Walker said. "I would become a foreigner without having a say on it."
Campaigning in the final days leading up to the referendum has heated up, with Scottish nationalists saying they wanted to free themselves from oppression and dismissing offers of more regional autonomy as untrustworthy. Unionists then accused the nationalists of lying. Pro-British Labour Party leader Ed Miliband was even attacked during a campaign event in Edinburgh. The British tabloid press managed to dig out a few final scandals. The Scottish Daily Mail accused Salmond of megalomania for proposing that a new position be created after independence.
Claims that Scots were about to take their fate in their hands at the ballot box were made by both sides on the final day of campaigning.
"I think the emotional side is nice - I'm a Scot, I was educated here," he said. "I care quite passionately about my country. But I think from the rational side it is something we cannot afford. We are wandering into an abyss and I think we are going to be much worse off."
The economic effects would be disastrous, he said, adding: "Why would you break up one of the most successful states? The UK is not perfect, and it has the same problems as Germany or France or America or any Western democracy and independence and rampant nationalism isn't the way to solve that."
A few blocks further down the streets at the "Yes" campaign office, Rachel Blair has a different take. She said Scotland's oil reserves would bolster the country's economy.
"At the moment we have a government in London that people in Scotland feel quite disconnected from," she said. "We need a government that is closer to home and more accountable to the Scottish people. I think we have got a lot of problems here. We have one in five children in poverty, families queuing up at food banks. We need to be in control of our own resources to address these issues."
Those for and against independence disagree on whether Scotland would remain in the European Union and keep the pound as its currency. But charges that Scotland would be left on its own are just fear-mongering, Blair said.
A number of trade and industry groups have warned against independence. Unions are split on the issue. The British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, spends her summers in Scotland but has not taken a clear position on the referendum, saying only that the voters should consider the consequences of their choice. Regardless of the poll's outcome, most nationalists say they want the queen to remain their head of state.
Polls will close at 10 pm local time and results from the vote are expected in the early hours of Friday. Some pubs in Edinburgh have had closing times lifted so people can congregate and hear the results. Some nationalists have even already setup a border checkpoint between Scotland and England - one that looked so real some drivers actually stopped and handed over their papers.
"I'm not for or against independence, " Jon Parker Lee of Manchester said after passing the faux-checkpoint. "I just want everyone to have a good laugh."
Wednesday, August 27, 2014
Snapchat valued at $10bn by backers
The popular messaging app Snapchat has reportedly been valued at $10bn (£6bn) by one of Silicon Valley's most established investment firms.
The evaluation, detailed by the Wall Street Journal, puts the start-up in the same bracket as young tech titans Dropbox and AirBnB.
The newspaper also reported that Snapchat now has more than 100 million monthly users, approximately half of its rival Instagram.
Snapchat was founded in 2011.
The mobile app, which is the brainchild of two US university students, lets users communicate by sending each other photos that automatically delete after a few seconds.
In just a few years, it has grown to compete with messaging and photo apps such as WhatsApp and Instagram - both now owned by Facebook - as well as Chinese companies such as Line and WeChat.
'Facebook territory'Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a renowned technology investment firm in California that was an early backer of Google and Amazon, has agreed to invest $20m in Snapchat, the Wall Street Journal reported, valuing the company at $10bn.
The evaluation, detailed by the Wall Street Journal, puts the start-up in the same bracket as young tech titans Dropbox and AirBnB.
The newspaper also reported that Snapchat now has more than 100 million monthly users, approximately half of its rival Instagram.
Snapchat was founded in 2011.
The mobile app, which is the brainchild of two US university students, lets users communicate by sending each other photos that automatically delete after a few seconds.
In just a few years, it has grown to compete with messaging and photo apps such as WhatsApp and Instagram - both now owned by Facebook - as well as Chinese companies such as Line and WeChat.
'Facebook territory'Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a renowned technology investment firm in California that was an early backer of Google and Amazon, has agreed to invest $20m in Snapchat, the Wall Street Journal reported, valuing the company at $10bn.
The valuation puts Snapchat "instantly in Facebook and Twitter territory", says Ian Maude, of research firm Enders Analysis.
However, he added, those firms "already have substantial revenues", while Snapchat does not.
"The bet investors are making is that it is going to be worth the amount of Facebook and Twitter one day.
"If you have got an audience, you can develop a substantial multibillion-dollar business."
Snapchat's latest round of funding comes after it reportedly rejected a $3bn takeover offer from Facebook.
In February, Facebook paid $19bn (£11.5bn) for WhatsApp.
Saturday, May 17, 2014
NY Attorney General Calls for Ban of Soaps Containing Microbeads
New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman has called for a state-wide ban of soaps containing microbeads, citing recent studies that show how harmful the tiny cosmetic abrasives can be to the environment.
The office of Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman released a new report detailing the damages that microbeads - tiny plastic beads that are used as cleansing abrasives in cosmetic products - cause to New York waterways.
According to the report, which was prepared by the Attorney General's Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB), "nineteen tons of microbeads are washed down the drain each year and many end up in New York's waters, where they remain for decades, acting as sponges for toxic chemical pollutants."
The tiny "toxic sponges" can then be eaten by fish and wildlife, spreading toxin contamination throughout entire food chains and threatening the New York ecosystem, the authors of the report write.
Alongside this release, nine additional officials and political figures joined Schneiderman to support the passing of the Attorney General's Microbead-Free Waters Act, which was first proposed earlier this year. This bill would make New York State the first in the nation to ban the sale of any-and-all products containing microbeads.
"New York has always been at the forefront of national progress when it comes to addressing the issue of plastic pollution," Schneiderman said in a prepared statement. "By passing the Microbead-Free Waters Act, we will show that New York remains a leader in protecting the health of our families and our environment."
The bill was unanimously passed by the Assembly on May 5 and is currently being considered in the Senate.
However, research has shown that microbeads are not just a New York problem. Similar battles are being fought in other parts of the United States and Europe as well. "Beat the Microbead" is an international campaign dedicated to eliminating the use of the plastic abrasives in cosmetics. According to the organization - which is supported by the United Nation Environmental Programme - approximately 11 percent of all environmental problems caused by marine debris can be directly linked to microbeads. Eliminating this threat could take a significant chunk out of the water pollution problem that some experts call "the plastic soup."
Encouragingly, at least 21 companies around the world have already expressed a commitment to "phasing out" microbeads in their products. Other companies have not acknowledged the threat of these beads, but none have taken pains to deny the claims of environmental experts, according to the EPB report.
The office of Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman released a new report detailing the damages that microbeads - tiny plastic beads that are used as cleansing abrasives in cosmetic products - cause to New York waterways.
According to the report, which was prepared by the Attorney General's Environmental Protection Bureau (EPB), "nineteen tons of microbeads are washed down the drain each year and many end up in New York's waters, where they remain for decades, acting as sponges for toxic chemical pollutants."
The tiny "toxic sponges" can then be eaten by fish and wildlife, spreading toxin contamination throughout entire food chains and threatening the New York ecosystem, the authors of the report write.
Alongside this release, nine additional officials and political figures joined Schneiderman to support the passing of the Attorney General's Microbead-Free Waters Act, which was first proposed earlier this year. This bill would make New York State the first in the nation to ban the sale of any-and-all products containing microbeads.
"New York has always been at the forefront of national progress when it comes to addressing the issue of plastic pollution," Schneiderman said in a prepared statement. "By passing the Microbead-Free Waters Act, we will show that New York remains a leader in protecting the health of our families and our environment."
The bill was unanimously passed by the Assembly on May 5 and is currently being considered in the Senate.
However, research has shown that microbeads are not just a New York problem. Similar battles are being fought in other parts of the United States and Europe as well. "Beat the Microbead" is an international campaign dedicated to eliminating the use of the plastic abrasives in cosmetics. According to the organization - which is supported by the United Nation Environmental Programme - approximately 11 percent of all environmental problems caused by marine debris can be directly linked to microbeads. Eliminating this threat could take a significant chunk out of the water pollution problem that some experts call "the plastic soup."
Encouragingly, at least 21 companies around the world have already expressed a commitment to "phasing out" microbeads in their products. Other companies have not acknowledged the threat of these beads, but none have taken pains to deny the claims of environmental experts, according to the EPB report.
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
Blizzard warning issued for Canada's Atlantic coast
Canada's Atlantic seaboard braced Wednesday for a spring blizzard, closing schools, government offices and businesses, and cancelling flights in anticipation of a record snowfall, powerful winds and flooding.
Authorities said winds could reach up to 180 kilometers per hour (112 miles per hour) and as much as 40 centimeters (15 inches) of snow was expected to fall in parts of the region.
Visibility was nil in the morning across much of the Maritimes due to blowing snow.
Most worrying, however, is the possibility of hurricane force winds causing a high tide to swell and damage wharves and flood coastal areas.
The storm, which is forecast to be the worst in a decade, has been consolidating its energy from several low pressure areas as it moved north along the US eastern seaboard to Canada.
It is expected to reach the island province of Newfoundland on Thursday after sweeping through Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
Authorities said winds could reach up to 180 kilometers per hour (112 miles per hour) and as much as 40 centimeters (15 inches) of snow was expected to fall in parts of the region.
Visibility was nil in the morning across much of the Maritimes due to blowing snow.
Most worrying, however, is the possibility of hurricane force winds causing a high tide to swell and damage wharves and flood coastal areas.
The storm, which is forecast to be the worst in a decade, has been consolidating its energy from several low pressure areas as it moved north along the US eastern seaboard to Canada.
It is expected to reach the island province of Newfoundland on Thursday after sweeping through Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
Chicago runaway-train driver 'dozed'
The operator of a Chicago train which derailed on Monday, injuring 32 people, has said she fell asleep while on duty, according to federal officials.
The unnamed woman, employed as an operator for two months, reportedly admitted it was not the first time she had dozed off on the job.
The speeding metro train jumped its tracks at O'Hare International Airport and hurtled up an escalator.
None of the injuries at the busy airport were said to be serious.
"She did admit that she dozed off prior to entering the station," National Transportation Safety Board investigator Ted Turpin said during a news conference on Wednesday.
Mr Turpin said the woman often worked an erratic shift schedule.
She was reportedly disciplined in February after falling asleep on the job as her train partially missed a station.
The woman is said to be co-operating with investigators.
The unnamed woman, employed as an operator for two months, reportedly admitted it was not the first time she had dozed off on the job.
The speeding metro train jumped its tracks at O'Hare International Airport and hurtled up an escalator.
None of the injuries at the busy airport were said to be serious.
"She did admit that she dozed off prior to entering the station," National Transportation Safety Board investigator Ted Turpin said during a news conference on Wednesday.
Mr Turpin said the woman often worked an erratic shift schedule.
She was reportedly disciplined in February after falling asleep on the job as her train partially missed a station.
The woman is said to be co-operating with investigators.
Apple's Trying To Make iOS Emojis More Racially Diverse
After Miley Cyrus quite rightly grumbled about the lack of racial diversity in iOS emojis a long time ago, MTV Act decided to ask Apple what it had done about it. Surprisingly, it turns out, it's pushing for change!
The enquiry—sent directly to Tim Cook!—was replied to by Katie Cotton, Apple's vice president of worldwide corporate communications:"Tim forwarded your email to me. We agree with you. Our emoji characters are based on the Unicode standard, which is necessary for them to be displayed properly across many platforms. There needs to be more diversity in the emoji character set, and we have been working closely with the Unicode Consortium in an effort to update the standard."
There's no obvious date by which the Unicode issues will be sorted, though—so, for now, you're stuck with an overwhelming white presence in your emojis.
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Monopoly invites fans to rethink rulebook
Maybe you and your friends have made Free Parking more like a winning lottery ticket by adding the proceeds from taxes and fees. Or you’ve started your own stimulus program by jacking up the take for landing on Go — or amended those pesky regulations limiting houses and hotels.
If so, you’ve been playing Monopoly incorrectly. But soon such “house rules” may receive an official blessing.
Hasbro, which has published the classic board game since 1991, is announcing Tuesday that it will incorporate the top “house rules” into a special edition of the game starting this fall.
“While the official Monopoly rules will not change,” the company said in a statement, “fans who love playing with ‘house rules’ will now have the opportunity to play them in their game.”
To kick off the promotional effort, Hasbro will invite fans to debate the pros and cons of 10 popular house rules on the game’s Facebook page through April 3. Then it will choose five to become part of a special edition and to be included as an addendum to the official rules in a Monopoly game guide next year.
The announcement may be odious to many Monopoly die-hards, who lament that most people do not play by the rules in the first place.
According to the official rules, largely unchanged since the 1930s, whenever a player lands on an unowned property and decides not to purchase it, the bank sells it to the highest bidder in an auction, speeding up the game and increasing benevolent sparring among players. Each player is to receive $1,500 - no more or less - to start the game, and the limit of 32 houses and 12 hotels that come with the game can add offer an additional layer of strategy by creating a housing shortage.
Perhaps most overlooked by lay players is the rule that if the owner of a property fails to ask for rent before the next throw of the dice, no rent is collected. It’s the cardboard version of “you snooze, you lose.”
Many common house rules cast aside prescribed limits: Injecting more cash into Free Parking; giving $400 for landing on “Go” rather than the stipulated $200 for merely passing by; using additional houses and hotels if the provided stash runs out; and providing higher tiers of cash payouts for rolling snake eyes. Some say jailbirds may not collect rent while behind bars, and others are in favor of haggling cash advances and co-ownership of properties.
Many of the house rules can prolong a game, which typically wraps up under 90 minutes in elite competition. In general, any rule that pushes more cash into the game leads to a longer time before a player goes bankrupt.
Hasbro does not break out Monopoly sales specifics, but taking into account the original tabletop edition of the game, digital versions and related -opoly games produced under a license from the company, analysts say sales have stayed strong, with several hundred million copies sold since the 1930s.
The nod to popular rule variations is the latest tactic meant to draw new attention to the old game. Last year, in addition to unrolling a corporate edition, the company announced the ouster of one token - the iron - and the introduction of the new cat. The Scottie dog token survived the decision unscathed.
But the game has been evolving since its inception. It traces its origins to Elizabeth J. Magie, a left-wing activist who received a patent for her Landlord’s Game in 1904. Over the next three decades, a collection of players modified her original rules, providing a generation’s worth of product testing before the game was sold by Parker Brothers.
And more than a century before social-media marketing campaigns, or incarnations of Monopoly on the iPhone, iPad or other devices, Magie acknowledged that players might need to make their own tweaks.
“Should any emergency arise which is not covered by the rules of the game,” Magie’s 1904 patent reads, “the players must settle the matter between themselves.”
If so, you’ve been playing Monopoly incorrectly. But soon such “house rules” may receive an official blessing.
Hasbro, which has published the classic board game since 1991, is announcing Tuesday that it will incorporate the top “house rules” into a special edition of the game starting this fall.
“While the official Monopoly rules will not change,” the company said in a statement, “fans who love playing with ‘house rules’ will now have the opportunity to play them in their game.”
To kick off the promotional effort, Hasbro will invite fans to debate the pros and cons of 10 popular house rules on the game’s Facebook page through April 3. Then it will choose five to become part of a special edition and to be included as an addendum to the official rules in a Monopoly game guide next year.
The announcement may be odious to many Monopoly die-hards, who lament that most people do not play by the rules in the first place.
According to the official rules, largely unchanged since the 1930s, whenever a player lands on an unowned property and decides not to purchase it, the bank sells it to the highest bidder in an auction, speeding up the game and increasing benevolent sparring among players. Each player is to receive $1,500 - no more or less - to start the game, and the limit of 32 houses and 12 hotels that come with the game can add offer an additional layer of strategy by creating a housing shortage.
Perhaps most overlooked by lay players is the rule that if the owner of a property fails to ask for rent before the next throw of the dice, no rent is collected. It’s the cardboard version of “you snooze, you lose.”
Many common house rules cast aside prescribed limits: Injecting more cash into Free Parking; giving $400 for landing on “Go” rather than the stipulated $200 for merely passing by; using additional houses and hotels if the provided stash runs out; and providing higher tiers of cash payouts for rolling snake eyes. Some say jailbirds may not collect rent while behind bars, and others are in favor of haggling cash advances and co-ownership of properties.
Many of the house rules can prolong a game, which typically wraps up under 90 minutes in elite competition. In general, any rule that pushes more cash into the game leads to a longer time before a player goes bankrupt.
Hasbro does not break out Monopoly sales specifics, but taking into account the original tabletop edition of the game, digital versions and related -opoly games produced under a license from the company, analysts say sales have stayed strong, with several hundred million copies sold since the 1930s.
The nod to popular rule variations is the latest tactic meant to draw new attention to the old game. Last year, in addition to unrolling a corporate edition, the company announced the ouster of one token - the iron - and the introduction of the new cat. The Scottie dog token survived the decision unscathed.
But the game has been evolving since its inception. It traces its origins to Elizabeth J. Magie, a left-wing activist who received a patent for her Landlord’s Game in 1904. Over the next three decades, a collection of players modified her original rules, providing a generation’s worth of product testing before the game was sold by Parker Brothers.
And more than a century before social-media marketing campaigns, or incarnations of Monopoly on the iPhone, iPad or other devices, Magie acknowledged that players might need to make their own tweaks.
“Should any emergency arise which is not covered by the rules of the game,” Magie’s 1904 patent reads, “the players must settle the matter between themselves.”
Candy Crush firm valued at over $7bn
Candy Crush Saga was the top downloaded free app in 2013
The games developer behind Candy Crush Saga, King, has been valued at over $7bn (£4.2bn) after it raised $500m listing on the New York Stock Exchange.
It sold 22.2 million shares priced at $22.50 per share - the mid-point of the range the firm had initially set.
King said it plans to use the money raised for "working capital" and "other general corporate purposes, which may include acquisitions".
Candy Crush was the most downloaded free mobile app of 2013.
It is the most popular offering from King - which has a portfolio of of more than 180 games.
The game's popularity saw King's revenues rise to $1.8bn in 2013, from just $64m two years ago.
But there have been concerns that the firm relies too heavily on Candy Crush and that if its popularity faded, the company's revenue and profits would be hit.
According to the company, its top three games - Candy Crush Saga, Pet Rescue Saga and Farm Heroes Saga - accounted for 95% of its total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2013.
The firm's shares will start trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday.
The games developer behind Candy Crush Saga, King, has been valued at over $7bn (£4.2bn) after it raised $500m listing on the New York Stock Exchange.
It sold 22.2 million shares priced at $22.50 per share - the mid-point of the range the firm had initially set.
King said it plans to use the money raised for "working capital" and "other general corporate purposes, which may include acquisitions".
Candy Crush was the most downloaded free mobile app of 2013.
It is the most popular offering from King - which has a portfolio of of more than 180 games.
The game's popularity saw King's revenues rise to $1.8bn in 2013, from just $64m two years ago.
But there have been concerns that the firm relies too heavily on Candy Crush and that if its popularity faded, the company's revenue and profits would be hit.
According to the company, its top three games - Candy Crush Saga, Pet Rescue Saga and Farm Heroes Saga - accounted for 95% of its total revenue in the fourth quarter of 2013.
The firm's shares will start trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday.
Search back on for MH370 wreckage
The search for wreckage of crashed Flight MH370 resumed Wednesday after the weather improved, with Chinese ships and Korean planes joining the hunt over a vast stretch of the Indian Ocean.
Gale force winds, rain and big waves prevented any sorties being flown on Tuesday but 12 aircraft will be in the air Wednesday while Australia's HMAS Success plans to conduct a surface sweep of an area where two objects were spotted this week.
China’s polar supply ship Xue Long was also due in the area, with other Chinese vessels on their way, as the search intensifies for the Malaysian Airlines jet that crashed into the sea after vanishing on March 8 with 239 passengers on board.
"Today’s search is split into three areas within the same proximity covering a cumulative 80,000 square kilometres," said the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, which is coordinating the search.
"AMSA has tasked a total of 12 aircraft today to search for possible objects in the search area."
Seven of them are military planes and five civilian.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said the search would continue until there was no hope of finding anything.
"We are just going to keep on looking because we owe it to people to do everything we can to resolve this riddle," he told the Nine Network.
"It is not absolutely open-ended but it is not something we will lightly abandon."
Six countries are now assisting in the operation -- Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Japan, China and South Korea -- to help bring some closure to relatives with definitive physical proof of the plane's destruction.
The US Navy has also sent a specialised device to help find the "black box" of flight and cockpit voice data, along with a robotic underwater vehicle that can scan the ocean's depths.
Before the weather halted operations on Tuesday hopes had been high that wreckage would be found after two new objects -- a green circular item and an orange rectangular one -- were spotted on Monday by an Australian military plane.
This followed larger "white and square" objects seen by a Chinese Ilyushin IL-76 reconnaissance plane, which came after satellite images and data captured by Australia, China and France showed indistinct items in the southern Indian Ocean
Mark Binskin, vice chief of Australia's Defence Force, underscored the daunting size of the area under scrutiny by air crews flying exhausting sorties out of Perth.
"We're not trying to find a needle in a haystack, we're still trying to define where the haystack is," he told reporters on Tuesday.
Gale force winds, rain and big waves prevented any sorties being flown on Tuesday but 12 aircraft will be in the air Wednesday while Australia's HMAS Success plans to conduct a surface sweep of an area where two objects were spotted this week.
China’s polar supply ship Xue Long was also due in the area, with other Chinese vessels on their way, as the search intensifies for the Malaysian Airlines jet that crashed into the sea after vanishing on March 8 with 239 passengers on board.
"Today’s search is split into three areas within the same proximity covering a cumulative 80,000 square kilometres," said the Australian Maritime Safety Authority, which is coordinating the search.
"AMSA has tasked a total of 12 aircraft today to search for possible objects in the search area."
Seven of them are military planes and five civilian.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott said the search would continue until there was no hope of finding anything.
"We are just going to keep on looking because we owe it to people to do everything we can to resolve this riddle," he told the Nine Network.
"It is not absolutely open-ended but it is not something we will lightly abandon."
Six countries are now assisting in the operation -- Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Japan, China and South Korea -- to help bring some closure to relatives with definitive physical proof of the plane's destruction.
The US Navy has also sent a specialised device to help find the "black box" of flight and cockpit voice data, along with a robotic underwater vehicle that can scan the ocean's depths.
Before the weather halted operations on Tuesday hopes had been high that wreckage would be found after two new objects -- a green circular item and an orange rectangular one -- were spotted on Monday by an Australian military plane.
This followed larger "white and square" objects seen by a Chinese Ilyushin IL-76 reconnaissance plane, which came after satellite images and data captured by Australia, China and France showed indistinct items in the southern Indian Ocean
Mark Binskin, vice chief of Australia's Defence Force, underscored the daunting size of the area under scrutiny by air crews flying exhausting sorties out of Perth.
"We're not trying to find a needle in a haystack, we're still trying to define where the haystack is," he told reporters on Tuesday.
Saturday, February 15, 2014
Crocodiles can climb trees: researchers
ORLANDO - Most people entering crocodile territory keep a wary eye out on water and land, but research suggests they need to look up.
Though the reptiles lack obvious physical features to suggest this is possible, crocodiles in fact climb trees all the way to the crowns, according to University of Tennessee researcher Vladimir Dinets.
Researchers in the climbing study observed crocodiles in Australia, Africa and North America. The study documented crocodiles climbing as high as six feet off the ground. But Dinets said he received anecdotal reports from people who spend time around crocodiles of the reptiles climbing almost 30 feet.
Dinets said crocodiles lack the toe and foot structure that would be expected of a climber. However, smaller and juvenile crocodiles in particular were observed climbing vertically while larger ones tended to climb angled trunks and branches, all of which is a measure of the reptiles' spectacular agility, he said.
"They just go slowly," he said. "Eventually they get there."
The finding was reported in January in Herpetology Notes in collaboration with Adam Britton from Charles Darwin University in Australia and Matthew Shirley from the University of Florida.
The researchers believe the crocodiles climb to keep a lookout on their territory and to warm themselves in the sun.
"The most frequent observations of tree-basking were in areas where there were few places to bask on the ground, implying that the individuals needed alternatives for regulating their body temperature," the authors wrote.
"Likewise, their wary nature suggests that climbing leads to improved site surveillance of potential threats and prey."
People who spend time around crocodiles have known about the climbing ability for decades, Dinets said, but this study is the first to thoroughly examine the climbing and basking behavior.
Dinets also was co-author of a widely reported study in 2013 that demonstrated crocodiles used sticks and twigs to hunt, balancing nest-building material on their snouts just above the water line to lure birds. The crocodiles lay in wait for hours and lunged when a bird ventured near.
That finding was the first reported use of tools by any reptile and the first known case of predators timing the use of lures to a seasonal behavior in their prey, according to a University of Tennessee press release at the time.
The latest climbing study suggests paleontologists studying extinct species should be cautious about drawing conclusions from fossils, adds Dinets.
"If crocodiles were extinct and you only knew them from fossils, you wouldn't be able to guess they climb trees because they don't have any physical adaptations," Dinets said.
"Assumptions based on fossils, he said, can be "far less correct than people think."
Though the reptiles lack obvious physical features to suggest this is possible, crocodiles in fact climb trees all the way to the crowns, according to University of Tennessee researcher Vladimir Dinets.
Researchers in the climbing study observed crocodiles in Australia, Africa and North America. The study documented crocodiles climbing as high as six feet off the ground. But Dinets said he received anecdotal reports from people who spend time around crocodiles of the reptiles climbing almost 30 feet.
Dinets said crocodiles lack the toe and foot structure that would be expected of a climber. However, smaller and juvenile crocodiles in particular were observed climbing vertically while larger ones tended to climb angled trunks and branches, all of which is a measure of the reptiles' spectacular agility, he said.
"They just go slowly," he said. "Eventually they get there."
The finding was reported in January in Herpetology Notes in collaboration with Adam Britton from Charles Darwin University in Australia and Matthew Shirley from the University of Florida.
The researchers believe the crocodiles climb to keep a lookout on their territory and to warm themselves in the sun.
"The most frequent observations of tree-basking were in areas where there were few places to bask on the ground, implying that the individuals needed alternatives for regulating their body temperature," the authors wrote.
"Likewise, their wary nature suggests that climbing leads to improved site surveillance of potential threats and prey."
People who spend time around crocodiles have known about the climbing ability for decades, Dinets said, but this study is the first to thoroughly examine the climbing and basking behavior.
Dinets also was co-author of a widely reported study in 2013 that demonstrated crocodiles used sticks and twigs to hunt, balancing nest-building material on their snouts just above the water line to lure birds. The crocodiles lay in wait for hours and lunged when a bird ventured near.
That finding was the first reported use of tools by any reptile and the first known case of predators timing the use of lures to a seasonal behavior in their prey, according to a University of Tennessee press release at the time.
The latest climbing study suggests paleontologists studying extinct species should be cautious about drawing conclusions from fossils, adds Dinets.
"If crocodiles were extinct and you only knew them from fossils, you wouldn't be able to guess they climb trees because they don't have any physical adaptations," Dinets said.
"Assumptions based on fossils, he said, can be "far less correct than people think."
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Canada’s Olympians enjoy passport to free beer
The value of a Canadian passport just went up.
Bright, flag-red beer fridges have been set up at Canada Olympic House in Sochi offering free Molson products to Canada’s Olympians and their sporty friends.
All it takes to open it is a swipe of a Canadian passport.
Once opened, the athletes can extract as much beer as they see fit.
The fridge looks something out of hoser heaven, but it’s actually the product of a modified webcam and a tiny computer.
They scan the passport’s image and then check if it matches what’s found on a Canadian passport.
If it computes, then the fridge’s latch is released and the passport-holder can extract as much free beer as is desired.
Molson’s spokesperson Forest Kenney said in an interview that the promotion is a continuation of a campaign that began last summer with the Rethink advertising agency.
In that campaign, which went viral, a fridge was left in random locations with a note that it could only be opened with a Canadian passport.
When a Canadian would happen by, he/she would be able to play the role of a good host and give the strangers beer.
The Canadian women’s hockey team created a short-lived flap after winning the gold in the Vancouver Olympics, and then celebrating on ice with champagne, cigars and Molson’s Canadian beer.
Kenney said he couldn’t immediately say how much free beer has been quaffed in Sochi and how much it cost to set up the fridge there.
Not surprisingly, reviews have been favourable from lovers of free beer, despite the blatant attempt to cash in on patriotism.
“Well played, Canada. Well played,” tweets ABC News producer Meredith Frost.
“1st time I’ve ever wanted 2b Canadian,” confesses John Elder of Nashville.
“This is why Canada is the greatest country in the world,” raves a tweeter who identifies him/herself as “FromIceLevel.”
The deft marketing move has also drawn favourable nods from major media, including USA Today, whose writer excitedly raved, “This Canadian beer machine is the most amazing technology in the Olympics.”
Bright, flag-red beer fridges have been set up at Canada Olympic House in Sochi offering free Molson products to Canada’s Olympians and their sporty friends.
All it takes to open it is a swipe of a Canadian passport.
Once opened, the athletes can extract as much beer as they see fit.
The fridge looks something out of hoser heaven, but it’s actually the product of a modified webcam and a tiny computer.
They scan the passport’s image and then check if it matches what’s found on a Canadian passport.
If it computes, then the fridge’s latch is released and the passport-holder can extract as much free beer as is desired.
Molson’s spokesperson Forest Kenney said in an interview that the promotion is a continuation of a campaign that began last summer with the Rethink advertising agency.
In that campaign, which went viral, a fridge was left in random locations with a note that it could only be opened with a Canadian passport.
When a Canadian would happen by, he/she would be able to play the role of a good host and give the strangers beer.
The Canadian women’s hockey team created a short-lived flap after winning the gold in the Vancouver Olympics, and then celebrating on ice with champagne, cigars and Molson’s Canadian beer.
Kenney said he couldn’t immediately say how much free beer has been quaffed in Sochi and how much it cost to set up the fridge there.
Not surprisingly, reviews have been favourable from lovers of free beer, despite the blatant attempt to cash in on patriotism.
“Well played, Canada. Well played,” tweets ABC News producer Meredith Frost.
“1st time I’ve ever wanted 2b Canadian,” confesses John Elder of Nashville.
“This is why Canada is the greatest country in the world,” raves a tweeter who identifies him/herself as “FromIceLevel.”
The deft marketing move has also drawn favourable nods from major media, including USA Today, whose writer excitedly raved, “This Canadian beer machine is the most amazing technology in the Olympics.”
Canadian coach’s act of kindness in cross country skiing at Sochi Olympics reflects all of us: Kelly
SOCHI, RUSSIA—After his own miserable afternoon in the midst of the greatest 24 hours in our Olympic history, Canadian cross-country ski coach Justin Wadsworth wandered over to the finish line.
His own athletes were all eliminated early. He was crestfallen. He wanted to watch the end of the semifinal in the men’s free sprint.
As he stood there, surrounded by other officials, he spotted Russian Anton Gafarov coming over a rise. Gafarov, an early medal favourite, was struggling miserably.
He’d crashed on a quick downhill corner and broken a ski. Then he’d crashed again. A long, thin layer of P-Tex had been skinned off his ski. It was now wrapped around his foot like a snare.
Gafarov was not ‘skiing’ to the finish. He was dragging himself.
Wadsworth looked around. No one was moving. Everyone just stared, including a group of Russian coaches.
“It was like watching an animal stuck in a trap. You can’t just sit there and do nothing about it,” Wadsworth said later.
In a race typically decided by tenths-of-a-second, Gafarov was three minutes behind the pack. He was trying to make it the last couple of hundred metres down the 1.7 km course.
Wadsworth grabbed a spare ski he’d brought for Canadian racer Alex Harvey and ran onto the track.
Gafarov stopped. Wadsworth kneeled beside him. No words passed between them. Gafarov only nodded. Wadsworth pulled off the broken equipment and replaced it. Gafarov set off again.
“I wanted him to have dignity as he crossed the finish line,” Wadsworth, a three-time Olympian, said.
That. That right there. That’s the Olympics.
If you don’t get a lump in throat thinking about what Justin Wadsworth did for a man he doesn’t know to speak to, but recognizes as a friend in sport, then you should head to the ER. You need a heart transplant.
The moment circled back perfectly to Sara Renner in Torino 2006, and the Norwegian official who tossed her his own pole once she’d lost hers. Renner won silver for Canada. Norway finished fourth.
The Norwegian, Bjornar Hakensmoen, later said: “This competition, and all competitions, it should be a fight. It should not be decided by skis.”
He doesn’t say anything there about winning. The important thing is the fight, and not just that. Fighting the right way.
Every two years, we send our best to the Olympics hoping they will express something essential about all the rest of us. All we ask is that they represent us with pride.
On that basis and more, Canada has just enjoyed the finest day in its Olympic history.
Sochi is the 47th Games — summer and winter — we have participated in. For 18 hours between late Monday night and early Tuesday evening, Canada led the total and gold medal count. For the first time ever.
We can point at the podiums — and for the third time here, there were two winsome and utterly charming young athletes to fall in love with on that score. Dara Howell and Kim Lamarre took gold and bronze, respectively, in the ski slopestyle Tuesday morning.
Lamarre had been dropped from the national program a year earlier after tearing up a knee.
“I was like, well, screw this. I have a chance. I’m going to keep putting my heart into it and give my everything.”
If you feel like it, you could spend all day wandering around Olympic venues here, bursting into tears.
The medals matter, but from the perspective of a whole nation, they are the dessert. The way these Canadian athletes and coaches carry themselves is the real patriotic meal.
For two weeks, they are the only face we present to the whole world. If so, thank God for Justin Wadsworth. Russia will remember what he did here longer than they will remember any Canadian medalist, in the same way that we still remember Bjornar Hakensmoen.
Our streak on top of the medal board — less than a day in the midst of about two years of competition over the course of a century — ended in the early evening. Norway took the lead based largely on their success in Wadsworth’s backyard, cross-country skiing.
Three Canadians made the heats. All were eliminated in the first rounds.
By banal statistical measures, the day was a failure.
Because of Justin Wadsworth’s simple act of sportsmanship, it becomes a great Canadian moment. He’s an American by birth. It hardly matters. He lives in B.C. His kids are Canadian. He’s wearing our colours. He’s us. Or, at least, the ‘us’ we’d like to think we are.
(Another lovely angle in all this — the other person who benefitted from Hakensmoen’s kindness to Renner was her teammate in that race, Beckie Scott. Wadsworth and Scott are married.)
We’re here first and foremost in the spirit of friendly competition. When we win, we want to do it the right way. We don’t want it to be about the skis.
Talking about it, Wadsworth circled back to Hakensmoen and Renner.
“Any coach would offer that pole.”
Well, Wadsworth was standing amidst several coaches. He was the only one who thought to help.
The best part of this story? When I talked to him, about two hours after it all went down, Wadsworth wasn’t clear on why I wanted to.
Because of the thing with Gafarov, I said.
His own athletes were all eliminated early. He was crestfallen. He wanted to watch the end of the semifinal in the men’s free sprint.
As he stood there, surrounded by other officials, he spotted Russian Anton Gafarov coming over a rise. Gafarov, an early medal favourite, was struggling miserably.
He’d crashed on a quick downhill corner and broken a ski. Then he’d crashed again. A long, thin layer of P-Tex had been skinned off his ski. It was now wrapped around his foot like a snare.
Gafarov was not ‘skiing’ to the finish. He was dragging himself.
Wadsworth looked around. No one was moving. Everyone just stared, including a group of Russian coaches.
“It was like watching an animal stuck in a trap. You can’t just sit there and do nothing about it,” Wadsworth said later.
In a race typically decided by tenths-of-a-second, Gafarov was three minutes behind the pack. He was trying to make it the last couple of hundred metres down the 1.7 km course.
Wadsworth grabbed a spare ski he’d brought for Canadian racer Alex Harvey and ran onto the track.
Gafarov stopped. Wadsworth kneeled beside him. No words passed between them. Gafarov only nodded. Wadsworth pulled off the broken equipment and replaced it. Gafarov set off again.
“I wanted him to have dignity as he crossed the finish line,” Wadsworth, a three-time Olympian, said.
That. That right there. That’s the Olympics.
If you don’t get a lump in throat thinking about what Justin Wadsworth did for a man he doesn’t know to speak to, but recognizes as a friend in sport, then you should head to the ER. You need a heart transplant.
The moment circled back perfectly to Sara Renner in Torino 2006, and the Norwegian official who tossed her his own pole once she’d lost hers. Renner won silver for Canada. Norway finished fourth.
The Norwegian, Bjornar Hakensmoen, later said: “This competition, and all competitions, it should be a fight. It should not be decided by skis.”
He doesn’t say anything there about winning. The important thing is the fight, and not just that. Fighting the right way.
Every two years, we send our best to the Olympics hoping they will express something essential about all the rest of us. All we ask is that they represent us with pride.
On that basis and more, Canada has just enjoyed the finest day in its Olympic history.
Sochi is the 47th Games — summer and winter — we have participated in. For 18 hours between late Monday night and early Tuesday evening, Canada led the total and gold medal count. For the first time ever.
We can point at the podiums — and for the third time here, there were two winsome and utterly charming young athletes to fall in love with on that score. Dara Howell and Kim Lamarre took gold and bronze, respectively, in the ski slopestyle Tuesday morning.
Lamarre had been dropped from the national program a year earlier after tearing up a knee.
“I was like, well, screw this. I have a chance. I’m going to keep putting my heart into it and give my everything.”
If you feel like it, you could spend all day wandering around Olympic venues here, bursting into tears.
The medals matter, but from the perspective of a whole nation, they are the dessert. The way these Canadian athletes and coaches carry themselves is the real patriotic meal.
For two weeks, they are the only face we present to the whole world. If so, thank God for Justin Wadsworth. Russia will remember what he did here longer than they will remember any Canadian medalist, in the same way that we still remember Bjornar Hakensmoen.
Our streak on top of the medal board — less than a day in the midst of about two years of competition over the course of a century — ended in the early evening. Norway took the lead based largely on their success in Wadsworth’s backyard, cross-country skiing.
Three Canadians made the heats. All were eliminated in the first rounds.
By banal statistical measures, the day was a failure.
Because of Justin Wadsworth’s simple act of sportsmanship, it becomes a great Canadian moment. He’s an American by birth. It hardly matters. He lives in B.C. His kids are Canadian. He’s wearing our colours. He’s us. Or, at least, the ‘us’ we’d like to think we are.
(Another lovely angle in all this — the other person who benefitted from Hakensmoen’s kindness to Renner was her teammate in that race, Beckie Scott. Wadsworth and Scott are married.)
We’re here first and foremost in the spirit of friendly competition. When we win, we want to do it the right way. We don’t want it to be about the skis.
Talking about it, Wadsworth circled back to Hakensmoen and Renner.
“Any coach would offer that pole.”
Well, Wadsworth was standing amidst several coaches. He was the only one who thought to help.
The best part of this story? When I talked to him, about two hours after it all went down, Wadsworth wasn’t clear on why I wanted to.
Because of the thing with Gafarov, I said.
Sunday, February 2, 2014
Canada's 'shocking' natural gas prices expected to continue to rise
Natural gas customers in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia who were facing record bills in January are being warned to expect another wave of increases in February, the fifth increase in the price of natural gas since September.
Daniel Picard's natural gas metre didn't record any unusual consumption at his Fredericton townhouse in January, so his record natural gas bill caught him off guard.
"I had never seen $400. I have seen maybe $250 or $200 — that's shocking," he said.
Picard is among thousands in the region coping with runaway natural gas prices that have ambushed northeastern North America this winter, according to New Brunswick government energy consultant Jon Sorensen.
"We've seen a record world price - the highest price we've seen for natural gas in the world from New Jersey to Nova Scotia. It's been like a horror movie," he said.
In Halifax, Heritage Gas passed along gas price increases of 110 per cent between September and January. That’s a bargain compared to New Brunswick where prices quadrupled for customers of Irving Energy and quintupled for customers of Park Fuels.
Enbridge executive Gilles Volpe said buying gas on spot markets this winter has been like high stakes roulette.
"Within two or three days we saw price swings from $5 to $75," he said.
Dave Young with New Brunswick's Energy and Utilities Board is warning even worse is on the way.
"The prices you had in January are very likely to be higher in February, so consumers should take whatever action they think they can take to prepare for that," said Young.
Natural gas is the most widely-used form of heating on the continent, heating about half of all homes. The second-most common — electricity — is also vulnerable to the price of natural gas because many power plants that generate electricity are gas-powered.
"This winter looked to be slightly colder than normal, but no one was really screaming for this kind of cold weather,” said Aaron Calder, a market analyst at Gelber & Associates.
All the cold air is resulting in a draw-down of supplies of gas in storage. They’re down 20 per cent from where they were this time a year ago, the U.S. Department of Energy said last month.
At the same time, drillers are struggling to produce enough to keep up with the demand for new gas.
The supply situation has been exacerbated by the fact that in the past, much of gas production was in the Gulf of Mexico. There, weather only plays a role during the Atlantic hurricane season in the summer and fall.
New sources of gas are on the mainland and they’re vulnerable to freezing, ice and snow. Wells that are not designed for such extreme conditions can freeze, halting production.
Daniel Picard's natural gas metre didn't record any unusual consumption at his Fredericton townhouse in January, so his record natural gas bill caught him off guard.
"I had never seen $400. I have seen maybe $250 or $200 — that's shocking," he said.
Picard is among thousands in the region coping with runaway natural gas prices that have ambushed northeastern North America this winter, according to New Brunswick government energy consultant Jon Sorensen.
"We've seen a record world price - the highest price we've seen for natural gas in the world from New Jersey to Nova Scotia. It's been like a horror movie," he said.
In Halifax, Heritage Gas passed along gas price increases of 110 per cent between September and January. That’s a bargain compared to New Brunswick where prices quadrupled for customers of Irving Energy and quintupled for customers of Park Fuels.
Enbridge executive Gilles Volpe said buying gas on spot markets this winter has been like high stakes roulette.
"Within two or three days we saw price swings from $5 to $75," he said.
Dave Young with New Brunswick's Energy and Utilities Board is warning even worse is on the way.
"The prices you had in January are very likely to be higher in February, so consumers should take whatever action they think they can take to prepare for that," said Young.
Natural gas is the most widely-used form of heating on the continent, heating about half of all homes. The second-most common — electricity — is also vulnerable to the price of natural gas because many power plants that generate electricity are gas-powered.
"This winter looked to be slightly colder than normal, but no one was really screaming for this kind of cold weather,” said Aaron Calder, a market analyst at Gelber & Associates.
All the cold air is resulting in a draw-down of supplies of gas in storage. They’re down 20 per cent from where they were this time a year ago, the U.S. Department of Energy said last month.
At the same time, drillers are struggling to produce enough to keep up with the demand for new gas.
The supply situation has been exacerbated by the fact that in the past, much of gas production was in the Gulf of Mexico. There, weather only plays a role during the Atlantic hurricane season in the summer and fall.
New sources of gas are on the mainland and they’re vulnerable to freezing, ice and snow. Wells that are not designed for such extreme conditions can freeze, halting production.
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Wikipedia to add audio to preserve history
The crowd-sourced encyclopedia plans to add audio clips to its biography pages to preserve famous voices for future generations.
The project seeks to capture short clips, roughly 10 seconds, of notable people, whether famous historians, activists, scientists or celebrities, and add them, along with a text transcript, to their pages on the digital encyclopedia.
The first donator to the Wikipedia Voice Intro Project, or WikiVIP, is UK writer, actor, director and broadcaster Stephen Fry, and the result can be heard at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_fry.
And while members of the project are approaching more people, the project has already received a major boost thanks to a donation from the BBC.
It is allowing Wikipedia to extract 300 voice clips from certain programs. As a result, Tim Berners-Lee, Aung San Suu Kyi and 150 other notable individuals also have audio files attached to their profiles.
But of course Wikipedia, being Wikipedia, is also looking to its millions of users to lend a hand and would like people who may know feted individuals to approach them for a sound bite.
The project seeks to capture short clips, roughly 10 seconds, of notable people, whether famous historians, activists, scientists or celebrities, and add them, along with a text transcript, to their pages on the digital encyclopedia.
The first donator to the Wikipedia Voice Intro Project, or WikiVIP, is UK writer, actor, director and broadcaster Stephen Fry, and the result can be heard at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_fry.
And while members of the project are approaching more people, the project has already received a major boost thanks to a donation from the BBC.
It is allowing Wikipedia to extract 300 voice clips from certain programs. As a result, Tim Berners-Lee, Aung San Suu Kyi and 150 other notable individuals also have audio files attached to their profiles.
But of course Wikipedia, being Wikipedia, is also looking to its millions of users to lend a hand and would like people who may know feted individuals to approach them for a sound bite.
Monday, January 27, 2014
Captian 'Refused Chance' to Return to Sinking Concordia
An official coordinating the rescue from Italy's stricken cruise ship told a court Monday that the captain, accused of abandoning ship, refused twice to be taken back on board after making it safely to dry land.
Captain Francesco Schettino, who is on trial for multiple manslaughter, insists that he slipped off the Costa Concordia as it rolled over after hitting rocks off the island of Giglio, and fell onto a lifeboat which carried him ashore.
In a widely-quoted phone call a coast guard official is heard upbraiding Schettino and ordering him to "get back on board, for fuck's sake" -- an order the former captain refused point blank to follow.
"When I got to the rock where Schettino was, I told him I would take him back to Giglio port so he could get on a dinghy and be taken back to the Concordia, and get back on board if need be," Carlo Galli, the head of the traffic police coordinating the rescue, told the court.
Thirty-two people were killed in the nighttime disaster, which happened when passengers were sitting down to dinner.
Some drowned after throwing themselves into the icy sea, others were trapped in the lifts as the huge liner sank.
Helicopters desperately ferrying survivors to safety flew over Schettino as he sat huddled on an outcrop near the shore, Galli said.
"He told me he had to stay, to supervise his ship. When I repeated the invitation to take him back, another officer from the ship said it was a good idea to try and get back on board. Schettino said no again," he said.
Captain 'was dry' after leaving ship
Schettino has claimed he begged the lifeboat he found himself on to turn around and take him back to the ship, but his request was refused.
He has also said the ship's owner Costa Crociere, Europe's biggest cruise operator, told him by telephone not to return to the stricken liner.
"Schettino was dry, unlike the rest of the passengers with him. He asked to use my mobile phone, but I needed it to coordinate the rescue. We took the passengers to shore, he remained behind with one or two other officials," Galli said.
The Concordia hit rocks off the island of Giglio on the night of January 14, 2012, with 4,229 people from 70 countries on board.
Schettino has admitted to performing a risky "salute" manoeuvre near Giglio island and is accused of delaying the evacuation process after the impact.
The court heard from Andrea Bongiovanni, an official who says he tried to persuade Schettino to sound the alarm long before he eventually gave the order to do so.
"The ship's safety manager and I loudly insisted, along with the second in command Roberto Blosio, that the general alarm should be sounded. But captain Schettino gestured that we should wait, he didn't give the order," he said.
"We only managed to later," and once the extent of the damage to the ship became clear, "the captain looked me in the eyes and said: 'My career is over'," he added.
The trial, which began in July last year, is expected to last for months as hundreds of witnesses testify.
Captain Francesco Schettino, who is on trial for multiple manslaughter, insists that he slipped off the Costa Concordia as it rolled over after hitting rocks off the island of Giglio, and fell onto a lifeboat which carried him ashore.
In a widely-quoted phone call a coast guard official is heard upbraiding Schettino and ordering him to "get back on board, for fuck's sake" -- an order the former captain refused point blank to follow.
"When I got to the rock where Schettino was, I told him I would take him back to Giglio port so he could get on a dinghy and be taken back to the Concordia, and get back on board if need be," Carlo Galli, the head of the traffic police coordinating the rescue, told the court.
Thirty-two people were killed in the nighttime disaster, which happened when passengers were sitting down to dinner.
Some drowned after throwing themselves into the icy sea, others were trapped in the lifts as the huge liner sank.
Helicopters desperately ferrying survivors to safety flew over Schettino as he sat huddled on an outcrop near the shore, Galli said.
"He told me he had to stay, to supervise his ship. When I repeated the invitation to take him back, another officer from the ship said it was a good idea to try and get back on board. Schettino said no again," he said.
Captain 'was dry' after leaving ship
Schettino has claimed he begged the lifeboat he found himself on to turn around and take him back to the ship, but his request was refused.
He has also said the ship's owner Costa Crociere, Europe's biggest cruise operator, told him by telephone not to return to the stricken liner.
"Schettino was dry, unlike the rest of the passengers with him. He asked to use my mobile phone, but I needed it to coordinate the rescue. We took the passengers to shore, he remained behind with one or two other officials," Galli said.
The Concordia hit rocks off the island of Giglio on the night of January 14, 2012, with 4,229 people from 70 countries on board.
Schettino has admitted to performing a risky "salute" manoeuvre near Giglio island and is accused of delaying the evacuation process after the impact.
The court heard from Andrea Bongiovanni, an official who says he tried to persuade Schettino to sound the alarm long before he eventually gave the order to do so.
"The ship's safety manager and I loudly insisted, along with the second in command Roberto Blosio, that the general alarm should be sounded. But captain Schettino gestured that we should wait, he didn't give the order," he said.
"We only managed to later," and once the extent of the damage to the ship became clear, "the captain looked me in the eyes and said: 'My career is over'," he added.
The trial, which began in July last year, is expected to last for months as hundreds of witnesses testify.
RCMP Drone Patrols P.E.I. Skies
RCMP have a new drone patrolling the skies of P.E.I. to get aerial perspectives on crashes and perhaps help with search and rescues.
The miniature helicopter caries a camera and operates by remote control. The unmanned aerial vehicle, as it's officially known, was custom-built for $18,000 for Saskatchewan RCMP. They gave it to Island police for free.
“The helicopter is carrying a Canon stock camera, like you'd buy at Future Shop or Staples. It's plugged into a live, encrypted, down link," RCMP spokesman Greg McCormick explained.
"It's a multi-rotor helicopter. There are six blades. It's made of carbon fibre.”
It fits in the back of a police cruiser and can be deployed in minutes. RCMP have just one regular helicopter to serve all of Atlantic Canada, so mini-copters could assist by taking aerial photos of highway accidents for crash analysts.
It may also help find missing people, RCMP said.
15-minute battery life
Sgt. Andrew Blackadar tested out the craft this week. "Actually it's a bit of fun. It's like a remote-controlled car, but a bit more sophisticated and it takes two of us to operate it," he said.
McCormick said it wouldn’t work for covert surveillance. “We don't use it for covert work. As you can tell, it's quite loud. It would certainly be a giveaway to its purpose,” he said as the drone buzzed overhead.
Its rechargeable battery only lasts for 15 minutes and it struggles in high winds.
The miniature helicopter caries a camera and operates by remote control. The unmanned aerial vehicle, as it's officially known, was custom-built for $18,000 for Saskatchewan RCMP. They gave it to Island police for free.
“The helicopter is carrying a Canon stock camera, like you'd buy at Future Shop or Staples. It's plugged into a live, encrypted, down link," RCMP spokesman Greg McCormick explained.
"It's a multi-rotor helicopter. There are six blades. It's made of carbon fibre.”
It fits in the back of a police cruiser and can be deployed in minutes. RCMP have just one regular helicopter to serve all of Atlantic Canada, so mini-copters could assist by taking aerial photos of highway accidents for crash analysts.
It may also help find missing people, RCMP said.
15-minute battery life
Sgt. Andrew Blackadar tested out the craft this week. "Actually it's a bit of fun. It's like a remote-controlled car, but a bit more sophisticated and it takes two of us to operate it," he said.
McCormick said it wouldn’t work for covert surveillance. “We don't use it for covert work. As you can tell, it's quite loud. It would certainly be a giveaway to its purpose,” he said as the drone buzzed overhead.
Its rechargeable battery only lasts for 15 minutes and it struggles in high winds.
Google Buys DeepMiind Artifical Intelligence Firm
Google says that it has purchased the British startup DeepMind, an artificial intelligence company founded by a 37-year old former chess prodigy and computer game designer.
The American tech giant's London office confirmed a deal had been made but refused to offer a purchase price, which is reportedly $500 million. The company was founded by researcher Demis Hassabis together with Shane Legg and Mustafa Suleyman.
Hassabis, who is on leave from University College London, has investigated the mechanisms that underlie human memory.
Artificial intelligence uses computers for tasks normally requiring human intelligence, like speech recognition or language translation. DeepMind says the company, based in London, specializes in algorithms and machine learning.
Google, like other tech giants such as Facebook, are anxious to develop systems that work like the human brain.
The American tech giant's London office confirmed a deal had been made but refused to offer a purchase price, which is reportedly $500 million. The company was founded by researcher Demis Hassabis together with Shane Legg and Mustafa Suleyman.
Hassabis, who is on leave from University College London, has investigated the mechanisms that underlie human memory.
Artificial intelligence uses computers for tasks normally requiring human intelligence, like speech recognition or language translation. DeepMind says the company, based in London, specializes in algorithms and machine learning.
Google, like other tech giants such as Facebook, are anxious to develop systems that work like the human brain.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Genetic Clue to How Limbs Evolved
Fish have the genetic machinery necessary to make fingers, but it is not switched on, a study suggests.
The research in Plos Biology journal sheds light on how fish evolved into the earliest land animals millions of years ago.
For fish to make the transition to land, an existing DNA architecture had to be "hijacked" in order to make digits, the researchers said.
In order to do this, they took genes from fish and inserted them into mice.
It was already known that the genes for limbs are found in fish but how they evolved to form digits remained unclear.
To unravel the genetics, the authors used the zebrafish as a model. But other scientists said that zebrafish were not a useful species for studying limb evolution.
Lead author Joost Woltering from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, said that he was interested in the "longstanding evolutionary question - how did limbs actually develop out of ancestral fish fins?"
In order to answer this, Dr Woltering and his colleagues looked at the genetics of fin and limb developments in zebra fish and mice.
He was particularly interested in the division of the hand and arm (or digits), which does not exist in fish fins and "is considered one of the major morphological innovations during the fin-to-limb transition".
Fish and land animals both have clusters of genes called HoxA and HoxD and both are known to be essential in fin and limb development.
These Hox genes are sometimes referred to as "architect genes" as they are involved in making many of the physical structures animals possess.
However, when these Hox genes from fish were placed into mouse embryos, the genes that result in the arm were switched on but not the genes responsible for the hand or the digits.
This suggests that the genetic information needed to make tetrapod limbs was already present in fish before the tetrapods evolved.
"During embryogenesis it is key that developmental genes are switched on at exactly the right time and right place to ensure the development of a complete, coherent good functioning adult organism," Dr Woltering told BBC News.
Another important conclusion of the study is that fish fins are not equivalent to the tetrapod hand and digits. Instead, the evolution of digits in land animals involved the repurposing of existing genetic infrastructure.
One of the co-authors of the study, Prof Denis Duboule, also from the University of Geneva, said: "Altogether, this suggests that our digits evolved during the fin-to-limb transition by modernisation of an already existing regulatory mechanism."
Other researchers in the field say that the study contains some flaws.
Jennifer Clack, from the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology, who was not involved with the study, said using the zebrafish as a model for the experiments was a bad choice.
"We know that this animal, and by inference its relatives... lack some of the developmental stages that make digits in tetrapods," she explained.
Prof Clack added that other finned fish such as Polydon [paddlefish] "do have that mechanism, operating in a similar way to that in tetrapods, to make a complex fin skeleton".
This suggests, she said, that the zebrafish at some point lost the ability to make digits.
This view was echoed by Per Ahlberg from the University of Uppsala, Sweden. He said that the molecular analysis was of a very high quality but that the evolutionary conclusions were flawed.
"This entire inference is based on the assumption that the zebrafish fin skeleton is reasonably representative of the ancestral condition for tetrapods, and it just isn't," he explained.
"Essentially, modern-day sturgeon, gar and bowfin (living primitive ray-finned fishes) have fin skeletons that are reasonably close to the shared ancestral condition for mouse and zebrafish."
The research in Plos Biology journal sheds light on how fish evolved into the earliest land animals millions of years ago.
For fish to make the transition to land, an existing DNA architecture had to be "hijacked" in order to make digits, the researchers said.
In order to do this, they took genes from fish and inserted them into mice.
It was already known that the genes for limbs are found in fish but how they evolved to form digits remained unclear.
To unravel the genetics, the authors used the zebrafish as a model. But other scientists said that zebrafish were not a useful species for studying limb evolution.
Lead author Joost Woltering from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, said that he was interested in the "longstanding evolutionary question - how did limbs actually develop out of ancestral fish fins?"
In order to answer this, Dr Woltering and his colleagues looked at the genetics of fin and limb developments in zebra fish and mice.
He was particularly interested in the division of the hand and arm (or digits), which does not exist in fish fins and "is considered one of the major morphological innovations during the fin-to-limb transition".
'Architect' genes
Tetrapods, the first four-legged creatures to walk the Earth, evolved from water to land over 380 million years ago in an era known as the Devonian period, often referred to as "the age of fish".Fish and land animals both have clusters of genes called HoxA and HoxD and both are known to be essential in fin and limb development.
These Hox genes are sometimes referred to as "architect genes" as they are involved in making many of the physical structures animals possess.
However, when these Hox genes from fish were placed into mouse embryos, the genes that result in the arm were switched on but not the genes responsible for the hand or the digits.
This suggests that the genetic information needed to make tetrapod limbs was already present in fish before the tetrapods evolved.
"During embryogenesis it is key that developmental genes are switched on at exactly the right time and right place to ensure the development of a complete, coherent good functioning adult organism," Dr Woltering told BBC News.
Modernised genes
"The most surprising result is we found [DNA in fish] which is almost identical to the higher order DNA structure that we found in the mouse."Another important conclusion of the study is that fish fins are not equivalent to the tetrapod hand and digits. Instead, the evolution of digits in land animals involved the repurposing of existing genetic infrastructure.
One of the co-authors of the study, Prof Denis Duboule, also from the University of Geneva, said: "Altogether, this suggests that our digits evolved during the fin-to-limb transition by modernisation of an already existing regulatory mechanism."
Other researchers in the field say that the study contains some flaws.
Jennifer Clack, from the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology, who was not involved with the study, said using the zebrafish as a model for the experiments was a bad choice.
"We know that this animal, and by inference its relatives... lack some of the developmental stages that make digits in tetrapods," she explained.
Prof Clack added that other finned fish such as Polydon [paddlefish] "do have that mechanism, operating in a similar way to that in tetrapods, to make a complex fin skeleton".
This suggests, she said, that the zebrafish at some point lost the ability to make digits.
This view was echoed by Per Ahlberg from the University of Uppsala, Sweden. He said that the molecular analysis was of a very high quality but that the evolutionary conclusions were flawed.
"This entire inference is based on the assumption that the zebrafish fin skeleton is reasonably representative of the ancestral condition for tetrapods, and it just isn't," he explained.
"Essentially, modern-day sturgeon, gar and bowfin (living primitive ray-finned fishes) have fin skeletons that are reasonably close to the shared ancestral condition for mouse and zebrafish."
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