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'It's where the World Cup starts for me': Goalkeeping legend Schmeichel tours Russia's host cities, 1st stop Saransk


RT
Sun, 15 Apr 2018 15:53 UTC
Millennium Square in Saransk, Russia
© Maxim Shemetov / Reuters
A 2018 FIFA World Cup sign is seen at the Millennium Square in Saransk, Russia August 25, 2017.
With just two months to go until the 2018 World Cup, Peter Schmeichel is touring Russia's host cities. This time, he visited Saransk to open the World Cup Park and challenge a goalkeeping robot.

Saransk - a one-hour flight east from Moscow - is the fourth city visited by Danish goalkeeping great Peter Schmeichel on his tour. The city "is the one I was looking forward [to visiting], because this is where Denmark plays," Schmeichel said while opening a football park in Saransk on Saturday.

"I am from Denmark, if you don't know, and my son plays for [the] Denmark team, so this is where the World Cup starts for me emotionally," the football legend said.

Schmeichel told reporters about his experiences in touring the 2018 World Cup host cities. "I am really looking forward to the party that... football will bring to these stadiums, and it adds to the library of all experiences I've ever had."
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An Apple memo urging employees not to leak gets leaked

Mark Gurman
Bloomberg
Fri, 13 Apr 2018 16:27 UTC
Apple logo
© Arnd Wiegmann / Reuters
Apple Inc. warned employees to stop leaking internal information on future plans and raised the specter of potential legal action and criminal charges, one of the most-aggressive moves by the world's largest technology company to control information about its activities.

The Cupertino, California-based company said in a lengthy memo posted to its internal blog that it "caught 29 leakers," last year and noted that 12 of those were arrested. "These people not only lose their jobs, they can face extreme difficulty finding employment elsewhere," Apple added. The company declined to comment on Friday.

Apple outlined situations in which information was leaked to the media, including a meeting earlier this year where Apple's software engineering head Craig Federighi told employees that some planned iPhone software features would be delayed. Apple also cited a yet-to-be-released software package that revealed details about the unreleased iPhone X and new Apple Watch.
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USA

Thomas Jefferson statue at University of Virginia defaced with 'racist + rapist'

Robert Shimshock
The Daily Caller
Fri, 13 Apr 2018 16:20 UTC
Jefferson statue
© (Shutterstock/Steve Heap)
Thomas Jefferson statue at UVA.
The University of Virginia discovered a Thomas Jefferson statue smeared with the phrase "racist + rapist" on Friday.

The vandalism likely occurred Friday, on the morning of the former president and UVA founder's birthday, reported NBC29.

UVA students, alumni, and community members previously plastered a sign reading "Black Lives Matter - F*** White Supremacy" to the statue and covered it with a black shroud in September.
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Dollar

Arizona Supreme Court's decision: Dreamers have to pay out-of-state tuition rates

Matt
The Political Insider
Fri, 13 Apr 2018 16:05 UTC
DACA Dreamers Millennials
The Arizona State Supreme Court unanimously ruled Monday that so-called "Dreamers" will have to pay out-of-state tuition rates. Given that those out-of-state students are paying out-of-state tuition, it's only common sense that out-of-country students do the same.

The case was specific to whether or not dreamers at Maricopa Community Colleges would have to be offered in-state tuition. The Justices ruled 7-0 on the case. Needless to say, it'll serve as precedent for any future cases where "Dreamers" claim a right to in-state tuition at other colleges and university's in the State.

According to the Washington Times:
The court upheld a previous 3-0 appeals-court decision that federal and state law do not give that power to the colleges, but to the state's political branches.
"While people can disagree what the law should be, I hope we all can agree that the attorney general must enforce the law as it is, not as we want it to be," Attorney General Mark Brnovich said in a statement.
Mr. Brnovich noted that in 2006, Arizona voters passed Proposition 300, declaring illegal immigrants ineligible for in-state tuition and other state benefits.
One pro-Dreamer group complained that this will triple the cost of tuition for illegal immigrants.
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Light Saber

Prof. Jeffery Sachs: "We know they sent in the CIA to overthrow Assad"


Information Clearing House
Fri, 13 Apr 2018 16:09 UTC
Jeffrey D. Sachs

Jeffrey D. Sachs
Jeffrey D Sachs, professor of sustainable development and of health policy and management at Columbia University in New York, is director of Columbia's Center for Sustainable Development and the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He is internationally renowned for advising governments in Latin America, Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Asia, and Africa on economic reforms and for his work with international agencies to promote poverty reduction, disease control, and debt reduction of poor countries

Professor Sachs explains the American tragedy of the Syrian civil war and why the only answer now is to get out and negotiate an end to the war.
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Laptop

Survey: 10% of US Facebook users deleted their accounts over data-privacy scandal

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Fri, 13 Apr 2018 15:17 UTC
zuckerberg congress
It looks like Steve Wozniak and Elon Musk are in good company.

According to a recent poll conducted by Techpinions, a technology research group, 9% of a sample of 1,000 people surveyed said they had deleted their Facebook page in the wake of revelations that Cambridge Analytica used the personal data of 87 million people in its work for the Trump campaign.

This revelation, brought to the attention of the media by whistleblower Christopher Wylie (who promptly saw his own Facebook account deleted by the company shortly after the New York Times and the Observer published the initial exposes), ignited an international scandal about how Facebook collects, stores and utilizes the personal data of its users to target advertisements - a business that has transformed Facebook into perhaps the most profitable company of its size in the history of capitalism.

While Facebook insists it doesn't "sell" data to advertisers, for years, the company allowed third party app developers nearly unfettered access to this data to build apps that could be integrated with the platform (Farmville, anyone?).

Comment: As has been said, "When the product is free, you are the product."

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TV

Why The Twilight Zone is still relevant

Matthew Wills
Jstor
Sun, 15 Apr 2018 15:48 UTC
Twilight Zone spiral
© Wikimedia Commons
When Newton Minnow became the head of the FCC in 1961, he decried television's "vast wasteland." The only weekly series he applauded was The Twilight Zone, then in the midst of its five season run on CBS (1959-1964). But nothing lasts forever, and the show's plug would ultimately be pulled for its low ratings and idiosyncrasy in a network line-up that included The Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction, and The Munsters.

Rod Serling, executive producer, host, and writer of 92 of the 156 episodes, sold back his large stake in the show in 1966, "suspecting, apparently, that the show would just gather dust in the network's vault," according to scholar Brian Murray. The Twilight Zone proceeded to have a spectacular life in syndication, the afterlife of television. As Murray argues, the show's legacy reveals its enduring hold on the cultural imagination.

Comment: Why Rod Serling still matters

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Tornado1

Last year's natural disasters were costly but not so deadly


RT
Sun, 15 Apr 2018 14:57 UTC
Woman holding baby
© Carlos Garcia Rawlins / Reuters
Woman with her son looks at the damage in the neighborhood after the area was hit by Hurricane Maria, in Canovanas, Puerto Rico.
A new report by the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED) showed that 318 natural disasters which occurred last year and affected 122 countries have resulted in lower mortality than in previous years.

Floods and hurricanes, as well as landslides and a number of other natural disasters, claimed 9,503 lives compared to the average annual figure of 68,000 lives between 2007 and 2016.

The year was not so deadly but it turned out to be the second most costly, according to CRED, which estimated economic damage at $314 billion. That was reflected in the impact of three hurricanes - Harvey ($95 billion), Irma ($66 billion) and Maria ($69 billion), affecting the United States and the Caribbean.
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Beaker

Mission accomplished? Syrian research lab destroyed in missile strikes produced snake venom antidotes, not toxic weapons


AFP
Sat, 14 Apr 2018 12:42 UTC
Syrian Scientific Research
© AP Photo
Damage is shown of the Syrian Scientific Research Center which was attacked by U.S., British and French military strikes to punish President Bashar Assad for suspected chemical attack against civilians, in Barzeh, near Damascus, Syria, Saturday, April 14, 2018.
Plastic gloves and face masks lay scattered in the rubble of a Syrian research lab destroyed by Western strikes on Saturday, where an official denied the centre was developing chemical weapons.

US, British and French strikes slammed into a series of targets around Damascus that the Western countries said were linked to the Syrian government's chemical weapons programme.

One multi-storey complex, in the capital's northern district of Barzeh, had been completely reduced to rubble, AFP's correspondents saw during a government-sponsored tour on Saturday.

Its roof had been punched down and several walls appeared on the verge of collapse.

Even hours after the strikes wrapped up, plumes of smoke wafted lazily up from the building and a burning smell still hung in the air.

"The building had three storeys: a basement, ground floor, and second floor," said Said Said, an engineer who identified himself as head of the centre's paint and plastics department.

Comment: Good points. If there had been any chemicals weapons there, the whole area would be a no go zone. US Lt. Gen. McKenzie is quoted as saying, "We believe by hitting Barzah, we have hit the heart of the Syrian chemical weapons program." Apparently not.

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Map

Mapping international buyers of Russian agricultural equipment, 47 markets so far


RT
Sun, 15 Apr 2018 14:16 UTC
Farming
© Ilya Naymushin / Reuters
Exports of Russian-made agricultural machinery and equipment have been growing slowly but steadily in recent years. Russia's farming machinery has reportedly managed to win 47 international markets so far.

The latest data from the country's Trade Ministry shows that exports of agricultural machinery and equipment from Russia increased by 3.5 percent within the first quarter of the current year against the same period a year ago.

In 2017, exports grew by 16 percent compared to the previous year, which saw massive growth of 36 percent against 2015, according to the estimates published by the industry journal Agrobusiness.
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