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Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Network Solutions reports more DNS problems
Network Solutions said Tuesday it was trying to restore services after another DNS (Domain Name System) problem.
The latest issue comes two weeks after a pro-Palestinian hacking group redirected websites belonging to several companies whose records were held by Network Solutions, owned by the company Web.com.
Efforts to reach a company spokesperson were not immediately successful.
“We apologize for the issues our customers have experienced as a result of an incident on the Network Solutions DNS,” the company wrote on Facebook. “We’re in the process of restoring services, and we appreciate your patience as we work toward resolution.”
The DNS is a distributed address book for websites, translating domain names such as idg.com into an IP address that can be called into a Web browser. In the past few months, hackers have targeted companies that register domain names and their partners.
A successful DNS hijacking attack can cause thousands of Web surfers to a high-profile website to be redirected to another site even though they’ve typed in or browsed to the correct domain name.
Avira, a security company affected by the attacks two weeks ago, said hackers gained access to its Network Solutions account via a fake password-reset request. Claiming responsibility was a group calling itself the “Kdms Team,” which also attacked the hosting provider LeaseWeb about two days before.
In a separate problem, Network Solutions said Monday some customers could not send email after it was blacklisted by a security company, Trend Micro, and other anti-spam services.
In July, Network Solutions fought off a distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS) that knocked websites offline and problems with MySQL databases.
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Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Job Growth Was Disappointing, But Some See Reasons For Hope
Hans Kahl (left) speaks with prospective employees at a job fair for veterans, in Miami on Tuesday. With job growth still slow, the Federal Reserve may keep trying to stimulate the economy.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Hans Kahl (left) speaks with prospective employees at a job fair for veterans, in Miami on Tuesday. With job growth still slow, the Federal Reserve may keep trying to stimulate the economy.
Joe Raedle/Getty Images
When it finally came out Tuesday, the September jobs report — delayed for 18 days by the government shutdown — showed a labor market moving forward. But the pace was slow enough to prompt many economists to view it as a letdown.
Job growth "is disappointing, given that employment is still down by about 1.8 million from its peak prior to the recession," Gus Faucher, senior economist with PNC Financial Services Group, said in his analysis.
The Labor Department said employers added 148,000 jobs last month — the 43rd straight month of growth. The unemployment rate slipped to 7.2 percent, down a 10th of a point from August. Still, the number of people with paychecks remained lower than before the Great Recession, with many potential workers not even in the game. They were sitting at home, rather than trying to find jobs.
The report showed labor-force participation was unchanged in September at 63.2 percent, but that rate's "long-term decent will continue" unless employers give sidelined workers more reason to resume job searches, Doug Handler, an economist with IHS Global Insight, wrote in his assessment.
Still, beneath the disappointing data, one could find some reasons for optimism in the new year. For one thing, economists are virtually unanimous in saying the relatively weak labor market makes it more likely the Federal Reserve will continue its efforts to stimulate growth.
Throughout the recession and weak recovery, the Fed has used all of its monetary tools to push down interest rates. One of those efforts involves a bond-buying program that has the effect of restraining long-term interest rates. In June, the Fed indicated that U.S. economic growth was getting strong enough that the central bank might begin to "taper" down its stimulus effort.
But given this month's economic disruptions caused by the federal government shutdown — combined with last month's sluggish job growth — the Fed probably will not act until 2014. "A December taper remains possible, but now is increasingly unlikely," Handler said.
Translation: Interest rates probably will still be low on home mortgages come spring.
Meanwhile, the September jobs report showed an increase in construction jobs, up about 20,000 workers. A separate report Tuesday from the Commerce Department showed that in August, private residential construction spending hit the highest level in five years.
So the real estate market may look pretty good for the spring buying season, with fresh inventory and cheap mortgages. A surge in homebuying would boost growth for lots of Americans, in construction, retail, landscaping and so on.
But that optimism assumes Congress will avoid another shutdown and debt ceiling crisis this winter. Congress has set a schedule for itself to complete a budget in January and resolve debt-ceiling issues by Feb. 7. If those federal fiscal matters are resolved in the winter, the economy could brighten with the blossoms. "Job growth should be stronger in 2014 as the drag from fiscal policy on economic growth lessens," PNC's Faucher said.
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Kim Kardashian & Kanye West: Through The Years!
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Have you heard!?
Kanye West proposed to Kim Kardashian!
And she said YES!!!
They started as buddies and bloomed into baby-makin' soulmates!
To celebrate the newly engaged couple, we decided to take a look back and reminisce over all our favorite sightings of Kimye!
CLICK HERE to view "Kim & Kanye: Through The Years!"
CLICK HERE to view "Kim & Kanye: Through The Years!"
CLICK HERE to view "Kim & Kanye: Through The Years!"
CLICK HERE to view "Kim & Kanye: Through The Years!"
CLICK HERE to view "Kim & Kanye: Through The Years!"
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Revolt TV CEO on Sean Combs' Plan to Conquer Cable
Sean Combs is betting big on Revolt TV.
At 5 p.m. EST Monday, the all music channel goes live in the homes of about 22 million Comcast subscribers and 12 million Time Warner Cable customers, marking one of the biggest launches of a cable channel in years.
Revolt TV is the latest brainchild of Combs (aka Diddy, P. Diddy, Puff Daddy), a serial entrepreneur who has found success in music as an executive and hip hop artist as well as in fashion, liquor, marketing and more, helping him accumulate a fortune that Forbes estimated in 2012 at $550 million.
Now, seven years after he first conceived a new kind of all music channel, Combs is pouring tens of millions of that into launching a service aimed at 18 to 34 year olds – members of the Millennial generation – who consume more music than ever but not necessarily in traditional ways like listening to the radio or watching cable TV. In fact, they are the generation often described as “cord cutters,” because they haven’t rushed to subscribe to cable and often are more likely to view TV on a mobile phone or tablet computer than on the living room flat screen.
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Combs has chosen Keith Clinkscales, who helped Quincy Jones launch Vibe magazine and spent years doing content development for ESPN, to be CEO of Revolt TV. He hired former MTV programming chief Andy Schuon as president. They have been working with a team of more than 100 other hires, mostly at Los Angeles headquarters and in New York City, to figure out how to make the all music formula work on TV.
Clinkscales says it's a good time to launch because music and digital consumption are both up.
"You have more and more bands and artists going across the whole eco system. Music is very healthy," Clinkscales tells The Hollywood Reporter. "To have a place that can be the center of that—we would like to earn that position by reaching our fans well. We have to have good access and engage with the artists and be able to go ahead and provide sponsors, advertisers, and record companies a place we can meet."
Two decades after he founded Bad Boy Records, Combs at 44 seems confident he can reach the younger generation and build a significant business by reaching his audience on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social media as a way to lure them to watch his cable channel. He calls it the first launch in the era of social media.
His pitch is simple. It will be fresh, new and unlike what you have seen before. “I said it twice,” he recently tweeted, “and imma say it again. No Rules. Anything can happen. @RevoltTV.”
PHOTOS: 20 Best and Worst Music to Movie Crossovers
Combs has crisscrossed the country in the last year meeting with brands and advertisers, talking up his channel vision to advertisers, media and some private investors who have joined his latest venture as minority investors.
He seems confident even though there are lots of challenges for a music channel. Consider that MTV started with a business plan similar to what Combs has in mind – get lots of videos at little cost from record companies and artists, present them with exciting young personalities, fill in airtime with music oriented news and attract advertisers who are hip to the value of this audience.
What happened, however, was that over time MTV couldn’t generate high enough ratings with that formula. So it shifted its focus to individual shows, first with reality and then scripted, pushing the music to MTV 2, until that too became more series oriented.
There is also Fuse, a music channel owned by The Madison Square Garden Company, Mark Cuban’s AXS pay channel, and of course Viacom’s VH-1, which programs music and series but for a somewhat older crowd. All have struggled to build their own viewership to a significant level.
PHOTOS: TV Showdown: Exclusive Portraits of 4 Top Executives
Revolt TV is one of about ten channels chosen by Comcast for carriage in fulfillment of a 2011 agreement when the big cable company bought NBCUniversal to provide more diversity across the dial. Combs was one of those who sought such carriage and he won that lottery; but now he has to prove his formula will really draw Millennials.
Clinkscales says that both Comcast and Time Warner Cable, which is also a charter carrier of Revolt TV, see this as a way to turn those cable cutters into cable consumers. The two cable giants are distributing but are not investors in Revolt TV.
“The leadership opportunity for them was to recognize what were trying to do is reach a new generation of people that are going to be watching cable in the future,” says Clinkscales. “When I came out of college getting cable was an extremely important thing in my life. For the generation currently coming out of college and going into the workforce that challenge is something cable operators have to address. We’re hoping to develop the kind of product that can help them meet that challenge.”
Clinkscales says that they believe the combination of social media, an online presence (but not a full stream of the channel) and smart programming carefully targeted at their Millennial audience will draw in viewers, who then will return because of the environment of music, culture, fashion and insider insights that they will create.
“This won’t be just a channel,” says Clinkscales. “The main thing were going to do is be a place where you can get news and information about music. We want to make sure when you come to Revolt, you’re getting a full picture of what is happing in the world of music.”
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In September, Revolt TV hired Bruce Perlmutter, the former editor of E! News and E! Online, to head the news operation. Clinkscales says they will have reports not only about music newsmakers, but also behind the scenes at concerts, music festivals and related events.
The shows being planned are being designed both to attract Millennials and to interact with them. One called Power To The People is supposed to reflect content based on feedback from the audience.
Combs' presence suggests that music and the related news will be mostly urban, hip-hop and possibly R&B-related, but Combs has said (and Clinkscales is adamant) it will program beyond that.
“We are working hard from the launch to be not just an urban channel but a channel that covers all music from alternative to rock and roll to hip-hop and down the line.”
Even country? “If young people bang it,” promises Clinkscales, “we’ll cover it. If the target audience we are after likes electronic dance music, we’re going to be there.”
They don’t plan to sign a lot of artists to exclusive music and video breaks, at least not initially. And Clinkscales insist that it will be one of the few places to discover emerging artists – whom it plans to identify early on and bring to the market.
“We want artists to be more vulnerable & say what they really feel,” read a recent Revolt TV tweet, “even introduce us into their private lives. Don't be upset when they do.”
“We're out here on a mission,” read another tweet, “to use music as an influence to make your OWN rules. Get it ? No Rules.”
Revolt TV also has a movie division, Revolt Film, which to date has one picture and one documentary under its belt. The movie, Lawless, starring Shia LaBeouf and Jessica Chastain, was released in Aug. 2012 and grossed about $51 million worldwide. Revolt Film came on board Lawless as a financier after it's premiere at the Cannes International Film Festival.
So will Combs rule as he has in hip-hop, fashion and as a vodka salesman? He has said he is ready to do and spend what it takes for as long as it takes.
“You can feel music now bringing back the excitement and emotion of the timeless years,” read another Revolt TV tweet. “It's a marathon, not a sprint.”
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Netflix's outlook, user gains reinforce growth hopes
By Lisa Richwine
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Netflix Inc gained more subscribers than expected at home and abroad, helped by original series like "Orange is the New Black," and predicted additional growth this quarter, sending its shares surging 9.4 percent to a record high on Monday.
Netflix, the biggest gainer in the S&P 500 in 2013, quadrupled profit in the third quarter as it added a higher-than-expected 1.3 million subscribers to its subscription video streaming service.
The company, which has invested heavily in original content such as political satire "House of Cards" to draw in subscribers, said it had 31.1 million U.S. streaming users in the third quarter. It expects to end the year with 32.7 million to 33.5 million users, accelerating that momentum.
"That keeps the view alive that this company has a larger subscriber base and has pricing leverage in its corner to extract more value," said Janney Montgomery Scott analyst Tony Wible, who rates Netflix a "buy".
Netflix's shares rose to $388.50 in after-hours trading, compared with their close of $354.99 on the Nasdaq. The stock has racked up successive life highs since September, as investors bet on its growth prospects.
During the quarter, Netflix released critically acclaimed prison drama "Orange is the New Black," part of its investment in exclusive original programming to keep and attract customers to its $8-a-month movie and TV streaming service.
Its original series slate attracted buzz during the quarter, with 14 Emmy nominations and three wins for shows including "House of Cards."
The company said it will double investments in original programming in 2014, when it will air second seasons of both "House of Cards" and "Orange is the New Black."
MOMENTUM
Wall Street also singled out the company's strong growth abroad. It added 1.4 million customers in international markets, bringing its reach in foreign territories to 9.2 million.
Netflix reported earnings-per-share of 52 cents, beating the average of 49 cents projected by Wall Street analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Net income for the quarter reached $32 million, up from $8 million a year earlier, Netflix said in its quarterly letter to shareholders.
Standard & Poor's equity analyst Tuna Amobi said Netflix appeared to be gaining traction in some of its newest markets, and noted that "Orange is the New Black" will end the year as the company's most-watched original series.
"There is not a whole lot not to like. There is a whole lot of momentum behind the story," said Amobi, who has a "hold" rating on the stock. "They appear to have turned an important corner for potentially sustained subscriber growth."
(Additional reporting by Liana B. Baker in New York; editing by Matthew Lewis)
- Finance
- Investment & Company Information
- Netflix Inc
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Daily Roundup: Surface 2 review, Google's Project Shield, LG's Chrome OS fixation and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Google's Project Shield
Not to be confused with NVIDIA's Android handheld, this Project Shield aims to allow small site owners to "serve their content through Google" in an attempt to thwart DDoS attacks. Head on over to the full post for more about Google Ideas' latest project.
Microsoft Surface 2 review
Microsoft's second generation of Surface tablets go on sale this week, and we've got you covered with a full review of the Surface 2. In addition to a slimmer, lighter chassis, Microsoft's Surface RT successor steps up to a faster Tegra 4 processor, sharper 1080p screen and a sturdier kickstand. But are these hardware improvements really "the changes the people need," to quote Surface GM Panos Panay? Click through to find out.
Unbounded Robotics introduces UBR-1
Meet UBR-1, a smaller, cheaper version of Willow Garage's famed PR2 robot. Serving as a mobile manipulation platform, the UBR-1 can move itself around and perform tasks like stocking shelves or inspecting products. Worried about the impending robopocalypse? Continue reading to find out whether this one-armed, $35,000 bot is coming to destroy us.
LG looks set to launch its first Chrome OS devices
LG has filed trademarks for "ChromeOne," "ChromeDesk," and ChromeStation." We try not to count our chickens before they hatch, but each filing could represent three new pieces of hardware running Chrome OS. Is LG jumping on the Chrome bandwagon alongside Samsung, Acer, HP and Lenovo? Follow the link and let us know what you think in the comments section.
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Betty White Spoofs Miley Cyrus For Her TV Show
Please GODS let this KILL that stupid wrecking ball
Ever since Miley Cyrus stripped herself nekkid to ride a wrecking ball in the music video for her #1 song Wrecking Ball, people all over the place have been spoofing her antics. Today, we learn that the one and only Betty White decided to hop on the bandwagon and ride a wrecking ball to promote the new season of her show Betty White’s Off Their Rockers. Thankfully, Betty remains fully clothed in the promo … check it out below.
Yo, Hulk Hogan, we’re going to let you finish—but Betty White had one of the best “Wrecking Ball” parodies of all time! That’s right, the latest star to channel her inner Miley Cyrus and hop aboard a piece of construction equipment is none other than 91-year-old Betty White! So what exactly is going on? Betty has teamed up with Lifetime to promote the news that her new show, Betty White’s Off Their Rockers has found a new home on Lifetime. And to spread the word, she’s taking cues from pop culture! While on the wrecking ball, Betty asks for a sledgehammer—though she keeps it PG and doesn’t opt for the French kiss, thankfully! Tune into Betty White’s Off Their Rockers Wednesdays at 9 PM on Lifetime!
LOL. I mean, this wrecking ball thing has been done to death but I do kinda love that Betty was game for giving it a go. BUT, as much as I am charmed by this, I hope this is the end. Seriously. Let it be done, peoples. No one will ride a wrecking ball or lick a sledgehammer better than Betty White. The matter is now closed for good. Right?
[Source]
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Monday, October 21, 2013
Verizon left security researcher hanging while reported URL hack revealed subscribers' texting history
Long wait times and a complete lack of transparency -- no, this isn't a story about a typical call to Verizon customer support. It's what happened when a security researcher discovered a critical privacy vulnerability on Verizon's consumer site and tried, nearly in vain, to get it patched. Back in ...Category: penn state football Once Upon A Time In Wonderland Million Second Quiz Asap Rocky Dustin Keller
Ending drug trial secrecy is a boon for R&D, says EU agency
By Ben Hirschler
LONDON (Reuters) - Europe's medicines regulator has come out fighting for greater transparency for clinical trials, arguing that its controversial policy to end data secrecy will be "a boon to drug developers".
The strong defence of greater openness by the boss of the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and colleagues comes as the agency battles a lawsuit from two U.S. drugmakers over its plans to release data on their medicines.
The London-based watchdog has been on a collision course with much of the drugs industry since deciding to lift the lid on previously secret trial data submitted by companies as part of the application process for new medicines.
Researchers and patient groups want access to this raw data to improve third-party scrutiny and stress-test claims about drugs. But many companies fear that this will damage their businesses and undermine the ability to defend patents.
EMA Executive Director Guido Rasi, who has championed data transparency since taking over at the agency two years ago, and his colleagues say that industry concerns are misplaced.
Rather than reducing the incentive to invest in drug research, releasing data from clinical trials would help drug company scientists hunting for new medicines, they said in a paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Monday.
The paper, entitled "Access to patient-level trial data - a boon to drug developers", says that the sharing of detailed trial results would increase efficiency in drug development and improve cost-effectiveness by reducing duplication of effort.
"Contrary to industry fears, we argue that access to full - though appropriately de-identified - data sets from clinical trials will benefit the research-based biopharmaceutical industry," they wrote.
"It is ironic that the organisations that most resist wider access to data are the ones that stand to benefit so much from greater transparency."
LEGAL CHALLENGE
A central concern among companies is that releasing raw data showing the effects of medicines on individual patients - whose identity is to remain hidden - would lead to "free riding" by rivals, who could avoid the cost of doing their own research.
It is an objection at the heart of the legal challenge to the EMA's policy by drugmakers AbbVie and InterMune, which in April won an interim ruling preventing the agency from releasing documents, pending a final court decision.
The EMA has since applied to have the injunction lifted and its appeal was heard in Luxembourg this month, but an EMA spokesman said it is unclear when the court will deliver its ruling.
In the meantime, demands for more transparency are growing, particularly in Europe, where Germany's Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care recently complained that the EMA measures do not go far enough.
The debate has also crossed the Atlantic. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is considering new ways to increases data disclosure, while the U.S. Institute of Medicine will discuss sharing of clinical trial data at a two-day meeting in Washington this week.
(Editing by David Goodman)
- Pharmaceuticals & Drug Trials
- Health
- European Medicines Agency
- clinical trials
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Morning Report: Dana White trying hard to like 'delusional' Roy Nelson
Now dropping back-to-back fights, Roy Nelson isn't getting cut much slack by UFC president Dana White, not that he ever was. Nelson, who struggled against Daniel Cormier in the co-main event of UFC 166, attributed his frustrating appearance to a tentative dance partner. Out-struck 74-17 (3-0 on takedowns) by Cormier, Nelson didn't garner much sympathy from White.
"It's stuff like that," said White during his post-fight media scrum. "He said Cormier wasn't engaging enough. [Cormier] outwrestled him, and he punched the living s--t out of him. How much more does he want to be engaged? Huh? He says some dumb s**t and he's very delusional."
"He says we've never given him a title shot when we should have got a title shot. Every time you get that close to a title shot, you get beat by the best in the world. That's why you've never had a title shot."
Once calling his relationship with the Prez more similar to that of a husband and wife, Nelson and White have traded barbs through the media for years. With Nelson signing a new nine-fight deal in July, some thought the pair had largely reconciled.
"Contrary to popular belief, I try so hard to like Roy Nelson. It's like, I saw him backstage before I came out to talk to you guys. 'What's up Roy? You looked good. You lost weight,' this and that. Then I come out and hear the stupid s**t he said to you guys right before I walk out there. The guy says the dumbest s**t I've ever heard in my life and he's very delusional.
That being said, I think he's an incredibly tough guy, with his physique and everything. I'm blown away he can compete at this level. How talented he is and what a great chin he has. But every time he gets above No. 5, he looks like he doesn't belong in the top 10. You get him in there with some guys that aren't and he looks like a world beater. Everybody starts yelling 'He should get a title shot!' Then you see him fight guys that are athletic and talented and he looks like he doesn't belong in the top 10."
Under contract for eight more and looking slimmer than ever, we'll have to see if Nelson follows Cormier's move to 205lbs.
5 MUST-READ STORIES
Dana scrum. Get the latest buzz from Dana White's UFC 166 post-fight media scrum.
UFC 166 Aftermath. Another dominating performance over Junior dos Santos behind him, Cain Velasquez still has plenty to prove before earning the moniker of 'best ever.' Dave Doyle breaks down the event's big stories.
Fortunes change for five. Dave Metlzer examines what happens next for UFC 166's biggest winners and losers.
The Purge. With Dana saying the UFC roster is too bloated as is, could we see leashes tighten across divisions to make way for new talent?
The Female Conor McGregor? See who fans are begging Dana and Co. to bring into a blossoming UFC women's bantamweight division.
MEDIA STEW
Cain retains the belt.
One for the ages.
Weekend edition of the Tommy Toe Hold Show.
One FC 11 Total Domination highlights.
Behind the scenes at Glory 11.
Video blog with Bas Rutten. Bas coaches his fighters at an amateur MMA event.
Quick Brazilian KO.
TWEETS
As always, make sure to check out our extensive Pro React piece to see what fighters had to say during the fights.
The morning after.
Matchmaking?
Maybe check out Gil/Diego.
Stone Cold.
Busy busy.
Salt in the wound.
GSP, the Terminator, who's next?
I still like Dodson's chances.
but together...
FIGHT ANNOUNCEMENTS
Announced yesterday (Oct. 10 2013)
Mike Wilkinson out, Robert Whiteford vs. Jimy Hettes at UFC Fight Night 30
FANPOST OF THE DAY
Today's Fanpost of the Day comes via SocratesRising.
Ok, ok I know what you are thinking - wtf dude, he just mauled JDS AGAIN for five rounds. Hear me out. I just watched the fight and I listened to Joe Rogan (I love him as an announcer btw) wax on about Cain's amazing cardio, talk at length about his work ethic and wrestling prowess. Cain is impressive as hell with those attributes. I was left somewhat dissatisfied by this performance though. Taking nothing away from Cain; I saw a fighter who is capable of absolutely smothering his opponent with constant movement and a relentless pace. I believe 95% of those 25 minutes were spent with Cain pressing JDS against the fence. When they broke either because of the rare occasion when JDS was able to create space or Cain just decided to grant space, JDS looked much better. Whenever they had space, JDS was clearly the more dangerous, dynamic and skilled fighter.
The old saying, just because you can doesn't mean you should - to me that rings true in a weird way here. If Cain doesn't possess great finishing skills, punching power or submissions - he should thank God every night he was blessed with 4 gas tanks when the average HW has 1/2 of one. He certainly is using the tools in his belt to the best of his ability. But to me that fight didn't seem fair in a weird way. It was like Cain was thinking, "I know you can beat me standing, so let me hold you here against this wall for 22 minutes of the next 25 and pitter pat you until you wear out."
...
Check out the rest of the post here.
Found something you'd like to see in the Morning Report? Just hit me up on Twitter @SaintMMA and we'll include it in tomorrow's column.
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TLC: A Girl Group's 20 Years Of Ups And Downs
TLC's Chilli and T-Boz attend the New York premiere of CrazySexyCool on Oct. 15, 2013.
Brad Barket/Getty Images for VH1
TLC's Chilli and T-Boz attend the New York premiere of CrazySexyCool on Oct. 15, 2013.
Brad Barket/Getty Images for VH1
Twenty years ago, Tionne Watkins, Lisa Lopes and Rozonda Thomas came together for the first time to sing and dance for music executives in the hopes of landing a spot in a singing group.
Those three women — T-Boz, Left Eye and Chilli — are now better known as TLC, one of the best-selling female groups of all time. It was clear to see early on that the members of TLC were not interested in competing with your average girl group.
"The funny thing is, we used to look at men as our competition, not women," T-Boz says. "Men can go out there and pump and 'Ooh, yeah!' and girls will fall out and everything. Honestly, the easy way out is to take off your clothes and sell sex. But we have proven and become the biggest American group with our clothes on. So, that says a lot."
As the group members' careers progressed, they also made headlines for some of the wrong reasons: their highly-publicized bankruptcy, and the day Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes torched a bathtub full of her boyfriend's shoes in a jealous rage, consequently burning down his house. And then there was Lopes' fatal car accident a few years later.
The group's career will be revisited in CrazySexyCool: The TLC Story, a biopic set to premiere Monday night. Surviving members T-Boz and Chilli spoke with NPR's David Greene; hear more of their conversation at the audio link.
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AP source: Suh fined $31,500 for hit on Weeden
ALLEN PARK, Mich. (AP) — Ndamukong Suh has been fined by the NFL.
Again.
The Detroit Lions defensive tackle was docked $31,500 by the league for a hit on Cleveland Browns quarterback Brandon Weeden, a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press. The person spoke Wednesday on condition of anonymity because the fine had not been announced.
Suh insisted earlier in the day he was unaware the NFL was reviewing his actions during Sunday's game, but acknowledged being used to the scrutiny.
"I think there is always going to be a microscope on me," he said. "I think there has been a microscope on me since I was first drafted."
Since Detroit selected Suh No. 2 overall in 2010, he has been fined seven times for more than $200,000. He lost $165,294 in pay during a two-game suspension in his second season for stomping on the right arm of Green Bay's Evan Dietrich-Smith.
Earlier this season, Suh was docked $100,000 for an illegal block on Minnesota center John Sullivan in Week 1 during an interception return. He lost an appeal last week, upholding the largest fine in NFL history for on-field conduct, not counting suspensions.
Suh wasn't penalized for his latest act that drew discipline, but it was shown on a video posted on NFL.com as vice president of officiating Dean Blandino said he wanted to look at it more for "potential helmet to the body."
Lions center Dominic Raiola — perhaps Suh's most vocal supporter — saw Suh's hit on Weeden after he threw a pass and said it was "ridiculous" that the league was even considering discipline.
"The guy is violent, football is a violent game," Raiola said. "I don't think you can ever make hitting somebody soft."
Raiola noted the officials had a better view, and didn't throw a flag.
"They were right there," Raiola recalled. "It was a football play, to me. But I guess maybe my view of football now is different than the way football is viewed now. I really don't know what they're looking at."
Suh knows the league is looking at everything he does, saying nothing in life is fair, but said it won't make him want to leave the game.
"Not everything is going to go your way in life," he said. "I understood that and grew up that way. It's just like for me, I wanted a Nintendo 64 when I was little and my mom said, 'No.' I had to deal with it."
And, now the Cincinnati Bengals (4-2) have to deal Suh on Sunday when they play at Detroit (4-2). Bengals left tackle Andrew Whitworth said Suh's after-whistle hits have diminished his ability to be known as a great player, but doesn't think he's a dirty player.
"He's not dirtier than guys that played the game back in the day," Whitford said. "The real truth is now he plays the game in an era where there's a TV camera covering every single possible thing on the field and a lot of stuff gets put on film. People know about it. Outside of that, people would never even know some of these antics. I think he plays the game on the borderline level with a lot of intensity and sometimes it carries on into extra stuff."
NOTES: Lions WR Calvin Johnson (right knee), RB Joique Bell (ribs) and CB Rashean Mathis (groin) were limited Wednesday while S Louis Delmas (knee) and OT Jason Fox (knee) were held out of practice. ... WR Patrick Edwards, who was cut earlier this week, was added to the practice squad and FB Shaun Chapas was released from the practice squad.
___
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Associated PressSource: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-10-16-FBN-Lions-Suh/id-9984f7bfe57049c4951ad598a295165eRelated Topics: Rashad Johnson FedEx Cup standings legend of korra Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them pga championship
Accident kills two San Francisco rail workers on second day of strike
By Laila Kearney
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Two workers performing maintenance on the San Francisco commuter rail system were killed when a train struck them on Saturday, on the second day of a strike against the system that has snarled traffic across the region.
A Bay Area Rapid Transit agency employee and a contractor were checking a possible dip in the track just north of the station in suburban Walnut Creek when they were struck and killed by a BART train operating on automatic control during a maintenance run, the agency said in a statement.
A BART spokeswoman could not immediately say if either of the two people killed was a member of a union on strike against the agency.
Unionized BART employees walked off the job on Friday after new contract talks broke down over pay increases and workplace rules, shutting down a system that carries some 400,000 passengers a day.
The two sides had not agreed to resume talks as of Saturday morning, according to spokeswomen for the two main unions involved. "We have nothing scheduled at the moment," said Cecille Isidro, spokeswoman for the Service Employees International Union.
The BART walkout is the second this year, after the agency's workers went on strike for four and a half days in July. Their unions and BART management were unable to reach a deal in the following months.
Experts say the strike will be an economic drag. The July work stoppage caused from $73 million to $100 million a day in lost productivity for riders, said Rufus Jeffris, spokesman for the Bay Area Council, which studies the local economy.
Unions announced the latest strike on Thursday, and a federal mediator ended efforts at conciliation, saying there was no more he could do. Little progress has been made since then, and the two sides did not meet at all on Friday.
Union leaders held a news conference on Friday afternoon, unveiling what they called a new set of proposals that could end the strike later that night if BART officials accepted them.
But BART officials said in a written statement they could not agree to the unions' "ultimatums," calling the proposals essentially the same offer that had already been rejected.
Union negotiators have demanded large pay raises, in part to offset being asked to contribute to their pensions and pay more for healthcare.
Under the terms of the last contract offer that has been made public, BART said it offered a 12 percent pay raise over four years to workers, who management says earn on average $79,000 a year, plus benefits. The unions put the average worker's salary at $64,000.
Union leaders have justified their demands for higher pay in part by pointing out that San Francisco is among the 10 most expensive U.S. cities in which to live.
After negotiating late every day this week, the unions said the sides had finally reached an overall understanding on pay and benefits, but were at odds over workplace rules the unions said BART had proposed at the last minute.
'MAD AS HELL'
But Grace Crunican, BART general manager, said in a written statement on Friday that the work rules had been an issue for six months and were critical to the rail system's operation.
"Using computers instead of manually recording and transmitting information is essential in the technology age," she said. Crunican also suggested that union leaders had mischaracterized the nature of the disagreement in the press.
"The unions grabbed the salary offer, but balked at the work rule changes. While BART and the mediators were still at the table, union leaders announced a strike to the media. They offered to submit to binding arbitration on work rules and falsely announced an agreement on salary," she said.
The proposed workplace rules at issue included allowing same-day schedule changes, eliminating marginal pay increases for certain senior custodial staff and scrapping past practices that included guidelines for how an injured worker would be integrated back onto the job, said Service Employees International Union spokeswoman Isidro.
Commuters expressed frustration at the stalemate.
"I am mad as hell. It's a big hassle - thanks to BART," said Jurgen Ware, who lives in the Bay Area suburb of Dublin and had to carpool to his job in San Francisco on Friday. He also blamed rail workers, saying they "have a stranglehold on the city."
After the July walkout California Governor Jerry Brown, a Democrat, obtained a court order preventing another strike for 60 days. But that order has expired and Brown would have to call a special session of the legislature to make another attempt to force an end to the work stoppage.
"An extraordinary special session, at this point, would not lead to the quick solution the people of the Bay Area want and deserve," Brown spokesman Evan Westrup said in an email.
BART commuter rail service helps alleviate car traffic in San Francisco, which ranks as the third most congested metropolitan area in the nation after Los Angeles and Honolulu, according to roadway traffic software company INRIX Inc.
(Additional reporting by Poornima Gupta, Noel Randewich, Braden Reddall, Alex Dobuzinskis, Ronnie Cohen, Dan Whitcomb and Jonathan Allen; Writing by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Alistair Lyon, Mary Wisniewski and Eric Walsh)
- Society & Culture
- Labor Issues
- San Francisco
- Bay Area Rapid Transit
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Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Announces 2013 Nominees
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has announced the 2013 class of nominees. Sixteen acts have made the cut, and the run the gamut from 90s grunge gods Nirvana and rapper LL Cool J to singer Linda Ronstadt and folk singer Cat Stevens — now known as Yusuf Islam.
Copyright © 2013 NPR. For personal, noncommercial use only. See Terms of Use. For other uses, prior permission required.
AUDIE CORNISH, HOST:
Today, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame announced its annual class of nominees. In total, there are 16 bands and artists up for induction and we're going to tick through a few in a not-so-veiled attempt to play some rock on our airways, starting with a 1990s mainstay, Nirvana. We'll take our teenage angst in flannel please.
(SOUNDBITE FROM SONG, 'SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT')
NIRVANA: (Singing) Well the lights out, it's less dangerous. Here we are now, entertain us...
CORNISH: Next up, the Replacements, the underground indie band never had a number one hit, but their influence on alternative rock lives on today in bands such as Green Day, Fallout Boy and the Hold Steady.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'ALEX CHILTON')
THE REPLACEMENTS: (Singing) Children by the million sing for Alex Chilton when he comes 'round. I'm in love. What's that song?
CORNISH: Folk singer Cat Stevens, now known as Yusuf Islam, makes the list once again. In the 1970s, his music captured a sense of yearning for direction in uncertain times.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'WILD WORLD')
CAT STEVENS: (Singing) Oh, baby, baby, it's a wild world. It's hard to get by just upon a smile.
CORNISH: Singer Linda Ronstadt is a first-time Rock Hall nominee. Her strength? Reaching into country music and turning it into rock. Bands would never describe her as no good.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'YOU'RE NO GOOD')
LINDA RONSTADT: (Singing) You're no good, you're no good, you're no good. Baby, you're no good.
CORNISH: Moving onto LL Cool J, born James Todd Smith, part rapper, part R&B artist, all around entertainer, he can now add repeat Rock Hall nominee to his resume.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'MAMA SAID KNOCK YOU OUT')
LL COOL J: (Rapping) With the funky brown, I'm going to knock you out. Mama said knock you out. I'm going to knock you out. Mama said knock you out.
CORNISH: And Peter Gabriel's no stranger to the Hall of Fame. In 2010, his band Genesis was inducted. But this year, he's nominated for his solo work, think "Sledgehammer," "In Your Eyes," and "Solsbury Hill."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'SOLSBURY HILL')
PETER GABRIEL: (Singing) Climbing up on Solsbury Hill, I could see the city light. Wind was blowing, time stood still. Eagle flew out of the night.
CORNISH: Finally, in the category of most makeup and highest heels, the band Kiss.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, 'I WANNA ROCK AND ROLL ALL NIGHT')
KISS: (Singing) I want to rock and roll all night and party every day.
CORNISH: Other Hall of Fame nominees this year include Hall & Oates, The Meters, NWA and The Zombies. For a complete list, check out the Two-Way blog at our website, NPR.org. And the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will announce its list of inductees in December.
Copyright © 2013 NPR. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to NPR. This transcript is provided for personal, noncommercial use only, pursuant to our Terms of Use. Any other use requires NPR's prior permission. Visit our permissions page for further information.
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Category: oarfish Lara Flynn Boyle Tom Foley columbus day rosh hashanah
Fandry: Mumbai Review
The Bottom Line
A film made with anger and indignation at India’s caste system introduces an explosive new filmmaking talent.
Venue
Mumbai Film Festival (competing), Oct. 18, 2013
Cast
Somnath Avghade, Suraj Pawar, Kishor Kadam, Chaya Kadam
Director/screenwriter
Nagraj Manjule
A film whose simple charm hardly prepares the viewer for the edge-of-street tension of its last fifteen minutes, Fandry is a uniquely effective attack on India’s banned but still lingering caste system. The setting is a humble village where a plucky, dark-skinned boy from a family of untouchables has a crush on a pretty classmate. Marathi poet and short filmmaker Nagraj Manjule brings lyricism along with drama and indignation to his first feature, which premiered at the London Film Festival and is India’s entry in Mumbai competition. It is well worth a look for distributors interested in top-of-the-line art films with export potential and interest for children, though the ending may be too shocking for youngsters.
Fandry means “pig”, but that definition only emerges towards the end of the film. It’s foreshadowed by the annoying presence of a family of boar-like pigs who occasionally run through the poor village where Jabya (Somnath Avghade) and his family live in a dirt-floor shack. They belong to a clan of Dalits, or untouchables, and are given the most menial jobs to perform by the villagers, who treat them with barely concealed contempt. They are the only ones, for example, who are "allowed" to touch the unclean pigs.
Jabya is a handsome, laughing young teenager who has a complex about his looks, his clothes, and of course his family. He attends school and heroically gets his homework done, despite the fact that his father is constantly sending him out to work. All these things keep him from expressing his tender feelings to Shalu, a fair-skinned girl in his class from a higher caste family. While his father escapes his problems and pent-up frustrations at the local liquor outlet, Jabya is befriended by a sympathetic local shopkeeper. He tells the boy that only by casting a spell on the girl using the ashes of a black sparrow can he conquer her love. This elusive, possibly non-existent bird becomes Jabya’s key to happiness and a poignant symbol of his struggles.
Along with tough scenes and Jabya’s teenage misery, there is the enchantment of early adolescence as he wanders through the woods with his pal in search of the black sparrow, or their successful bike trip to sell ice cream in the next town. Manjule, who honed his filmmaking skills in short films like the award-winning Pistuliya, wisely avoids hammering the audience with a sense of foreboding. In fact everything that happens in the film emerges naturally out of the story and characters. Young Avgahde is totally charming in the lead role, and his gradual rebellion against his clan and their expectations for him lead to the kick in the stomach of the final shot.
The story has a natural rhythm, but it moves forward without indulgence. In a small subplot, the father earnestly searches for dowry money to get one of his daughters married. This leads to the climactic final scenes of a pig chase through the village that brings the film’s underlying tension to a boil and a final explosion. It's one of those rare films that really fulfills a social purpose, for it's hard to imagine anyone watching Fandry and not abhorring the way caste is used as an excuse to degrade human beings.
Venue: Mumbai Film Festival (competing), May 18, 2013.
Production company: Navlakha Arts and Holy Basil Productions
Cast: Somnath Avghade, Suraj Pawar, Kishor Kadam, Chaya Kadam, Sakshi Vyavhare
Director: Nagraj Manjule
Screenwriter: Nagraj Manjule
Producers: Vivek Kajaria, Nilesh Navalakha
Director of photography: Vikram Amladi
Editor: Chandan Arora
No rating, 105 minutes.
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Sunday, October 20, 2013
Kanye West Suffers Major Wardrobe Malfunction As Crotch Of Pants Splits Open During Concert!
We see London, we see France, we see Yeezy's underpants!!!
We hope those aren't Kanye West's personally designed leather pants because it looks like they might not be so well made!
While performing his opening show for his Yeezus Tour, Kanye probably caught a nice breeze down below as his pants ripped wide open at the crotch. They split so wide it almost distracted us from whatever he's wearing on his head.
For all we know, Kanye meant for his pants to split because he's trying to create a new trend. We're just glad for his sake that he didn't go commando!
We know some ladiez in Hollywood who could learn a thing or two from Yeezy!
[Image via Splash News.]
Tags: crotch, kanye west, music minute, oops!, pants, split, wardrobe malfunction, yeezus, yeezy
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Anoushka Shankar And Norah Jones: Half-Sisters Collaborate At Last
Anoushka Shankar's new album, Traces of You, comes out Tuesday.
Harper Smith/Courtesy of the artist
Anoushka Shankar's new album, Traces of You, comes out Tuesday.
Harper Smith/Courtesy of the artist
Anoushka Shankar began playing sitar with her famous father, the late Ravi Shankar, when she was 4. But until recently, she'd never entered a studio with her other famous relative, half-sister Norah Jones.
When the two met up in New York recently to work on a new song together, a spooky thing happened: Working off Shankar's lyrics, Jones devised a tune that sounded remarkably similar to one their father had written in 1955 for the acclaimed Bengali film Pather Panchali.
"And when I said that to her, I was surprised to find out that she'd never heard that melody before," Anoushka Shankar says. "And it just felt like a lovely affirmation that we were on the right track."
That song, "Unsaid," is one of several collaborations on Shankar's new album, Traces of You. She discusses the making of the record with NPR's Arun Rath. Hear more of their conversation at the audio link.
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Mumbai Film Festival: Costa Gavras Honored With Lifetime Achievement Award
Mumbai Film Festival
Costa Gavras presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award by Mumbai Academy of Moving Images chairman Shyam Benegal
MUMBAI -- The 15th Mumbai Film Festival opened Thursday evening with an opening ceremony that saw lifetime achievement awards being presented to Costa Gavras and Indian film icon Kamal Haasan. The ceremony also included the traditional lighting of a lamp, which was done by top Bollywood actress Sonakshi Sinha. She was accompanied by the Mumbai Academy of Moving Images chairman and veteran director Shyam Benegal and MAMI trustee Amit Khanna, among other dignitaries.
“I’m happy to receive the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Mumbai Film Festival,” said Gavras who was presented the award by Benegal. “It is wonderful to see Indian cinema has a large local audience watching their films. I wish the festival best of luck.” The festival's program includes a retrospective of Gavras' works including his acclaimed political thriller Z.
PHOTOS: Indian Talent Going Global
Leading actor-director-producer Kamal Haasan was bestowed with the Indian Lifetime Achievement Award, which was presented by the chief minister of Maharashtra state (of which Mumbai is the capital), Prithviraj Chavan.
“There never was a method to my acting. I simply had great teachers, some of whom are present here tonight -- I respect them a lot,” said Haasan in his acceptance speech. “Festivals have also taught me a lot and I am humbled to have received this honor.”
“The state of Maharashtra supports and will continue to support this festival. I have been a huge fan of Mr. Gavras and Kamal Haasan,” Chavan remarked, adding that he saw Z "when I was in college and it had an impact on me." While referring to himself as "the odd man out in this gathering of great film-makers and artists," Chavan said that among other pressing issues faced by the film industry, the government would be considering the long-discussed proposal of establishing a Bollywood museum in Mumbai's Film City studio complex.
The opening ceremony was held at the festival's main venue, Liberty Theatre in south Mumbai, an art deco cinema with old world charm. The cinema was built in 1947, the year of India's independence from British rule. MFF has been moving from one venue to another in the absence of a permanent site, something that Benegal asked government for in his opening address.
STORY: 'The Butler' to Open Mumbai Film Festival
MFF is presented by Reliance Entertainment with MAMI, an industry body featuring leading Indian film figures, founded in 1997 by the late filmmaker Hrishikesh Mukherjee.
This year's festival competition jury is presided over by Driving Miss Daisy director Bruce Beresford, with fellow members including French actress Nathalie Baye, Japanese film-maker Masato Harada, Indian actress Konkona Sen Sharma and Canada-based Indian director Deepa Mehta.
The India Gold competition jury is headed by Oscar winning Iranian director Asghar Farhadi (A Separation) while fellow jurists include Australian film editor Jill Bilcock (Moulin Rouge), British actor-director Waris Hussein (Passage to India), Afghan director Siddiq Barmak (Osama) and Hong Kong International Film Festival director and film critic, Roger Garcia.
The festival opened with a screening of Lee Daniels' The Butler starring Forest Whitaker. The festival's closing film is The Fifth Estate, which will screen after the awards ceremony on Oct. 24.
MFF will feature more than 200 films from 65 countries, including spotlights on Spanish, French and Cambodian cinema. The festival will also pay tribute to the late Bollywood icon Yash Chopra (who passed away last October), the late Bengali director Rituparno Ghosh and the late Bollywood actor Pran.
Running alongside the festival will be the three-day Mumbai Film Mart which opens Friday.
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Remembering The Woman Who Gave Motown Its Charm
Powell mentored Motown artists like Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, and the Supremes. "Ladies dance with their feet, not their buttocks," she'd tell the girl groups.
Tony Ding/AP
In 2007, decades after Maxine Powell had retired from training a generation of black artists at Motown, a reporter from a Cleveland television station askedif anyone had been particularly difficult for her to work with.
Powell cut her off before she finished. "I don't have that," she said. "No one is difficult. Each person is a beautiful, unique human being. So if you have a problem and you're acting negative, you have been conditioned."
She went on. "So I said to my students, 'Allow me to help you unlearn that and realize and discover what a beautiful flower you are.'"
Powell, who died this weekend at the age of 98, was Motown's director of artist development during its heyday, and her job was to teach the label's young musicians how to present themselves in public. "They did come from humble beginnings," she told the Cleveland reporter, "some of them from the projects, some of them were using street language, some were rude and crude."
But to audiences at the time, those beginnings would have been invisible. For a long stretch in the 1960s, Motown's clean, factory-precise sound dominated popular music. The label's roster — the Temptations, the Supremes, The Jackson 5 — helped desegregate the radio waves. Motown was a kind of machine: songs were written by committee and artists had their images meticulously managed and cultivated. This meant that Motown's artists made incursions into places that black artists were not often seen; according to a Contemporary Black Biography interview, Powell told artists she was preparing them for "the White House and Buckingham Palace."
She was known to her charges as a straight-talking taskmaster. In 2009, All Things Considered host Rebecca Roberts asked her what kind of tips she gave artists:
Body language. Everybody walks, but I teach how to glide. I teach how if you drop something, how to pick it up. If your slip comes down around your feet, how to stand in the basic standing position and step out of it smiling, with your hip bones pushed forward and the buttocks pushed under. You never, never protrude the buttocks because it means an ugly gesture, you see? They learned all of those things. I was turned loose to do whatever was necessary to make the artist look first-class.
But some artists were initially resistant to her instruction. She told the Detroit News that Marvin Gaye felt that he didn't "need 'charm school'."
She corrected him: "It's a finishing school."
"Well, I don't need finishing," he told her.
"You don't need as much as some, but you close your eyes when you're singing, and people think you're asleep, I told him," Powell recalled. "And you slouch. So we'll work on those two things."
She also worked with the Temptations, Tammi Terrell, Smokey Robinson and Stevie Wonder. ("But I didn't do anything for Stevie," she told Rebecca Roberts. "Stevie was always beautiful.")
"Two days a week when you were back in Detroit you had to go to artists' development," Smokey Robinson said. "It was mandatory. You went there and learned so many things about being in show businesses."
But Powell said that her work wasn't simply about prettifying pop stars — she saw it as part of the larger fight for black progress. "All my life I was thinking of things that would help my race become outstanding and I thought of class and style...two things that would be accepted around the world," she told the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Just this summer, Powell told people gathered at an event in her honor that she would "teach until there's no breath left in my body." And indeed, Martha Reeves, the lead singer of the Vandellas and later a member of Detroit's city council, said she dispatched Powell to schools and retirement homes to teach children and the elderly about "poise and pride."
Today, black artists don't have trouble making it to the White House. Beyonce was the toast of the inaugural ball in 2008, and Jay-Z, her husband, was on the dais during the President Obama's second inauguration this year. Black artists no longer need charm school to burnish their palatability with white audiences; today, authenticity has as much cachet as respectability, if not more. Motown desegregated the airwaves, normalizing black celebrity enough that black people would eventually not always have to be perfect in public spaces. (Indeed, many of the artists that Powell tutored – Gaye and Terrell, in particular — later dealt with their demons in the limelight.) That's a reality that Maxine Powell and Motown helped to bring about, even if that may not have been their intent.
To the last, Powell was a picture of grace.
"Thank you so much for being here," Roberts said to her on All Things Considered.
Impeccable as always, Powell responded: "You're perfectly welcome."
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