title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: Toyota, Honda, and Nissan are all in the "BusinessWeek" magazine's "100 Top Global Brands" by dollar value, as ranked by leading brand consultancy Interbrand. The Toyota marque was valued at US$22.67 billion, ranking it ninth among all global brand names - automotive or non-automotive, edging out that of Mercedes-Benz. 2010 end of year production figures from the International Organization of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers shows that Toyota holds the number 1 spot, Nissan number 6, and Honda number 7.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: The German trio Audi, Mercedes-Benz and BMW are often referred to as "Germany's Big Three", although the actual major automobile manufacturers are the Volkswagen Group (majority owner of Audi AG), the Mercedes-Benz Group, and BMW.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: Other major German manufacturers are Opel and Ford-Werke, but are not considered as part of this grouping, although they are among the top selling brands in Europe - they are both foreign-owned (Opel is a subsidiary of Stellantis since 2021 and had been owned by PSA Group and General Motors before that, whilst Ford Werke is a wholly owned subsidiary of Ford Motor Company), and are largely Germany based and carry out much of their research and development in the nation.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: Volkswagen Group has long been the largest automaker in Europe. As of 2007 it edged out Ford to rank third in the world after General Motors and Toyota. It is also the parent group of Audi, Porsche, SEAT, Škoda, Bugatti, Lamborghini and Bentley.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: BMW also produces Mini branded vehicles, and has been the parent company of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars since 1998.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: Renault, Peugeot and Citroën are often referred to as France's Big Three although the latter two are subsidiary brands of Stellantis N.V. Originally, Groupe PSA were the owners of Peugeot and Citroën until the merger with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles in 2021, forming Stellantis.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: France was a pioneer in the automotive industry and is the 11th-largest automobile manufacturer in the world by 2015 unit production and the third-largest in Europe (after Germany and Spain). It had consistently been the 4th-largest from the end of World War II up to 2000.


title: Big Three (automobile manufacturers)

text: The France-based Renault Trucks is a major producer of commercial vehicles and is owned by Volvo AB. Both Stellantis and Renault produce a large number of vehicles outside France.


title: Crazy Town

text: Crazy Town (sometimes abbreviated as CXT) is an American rap rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1995 by Bret Mazur and Seth Binzer. Crazy Town is best known for their 2000 hit single "Butterfly", which reached number one on the US "Billboard" Hot 100 chart and helped their debut album, "The Gift of Game" (1999), sell over 1.6 million units. Their follow-up album, "Darkhorse" (2002), failed to achieve the same level of success, contributing to the band's breakup in 2003. Mazur and Binzer reformed the band in 2007 and released their third album, "The Brimstone Sluggers", in 2015. In 2017, Mazur left the band and Binzer changed the name of the band to Crazy Town X.


title: Crazy Town

text: Bret Mazur and Seth Binzer, who go by the names of Epic and Shifty Shellshock, respectively, started collaborating under the name of "The Brimstone Sluggers" in 1995 in Los Angeles, along with Adam Bravin (a.k.a. DJ Adam 12) who preceded DJ AM. However, they did not become serious about releasing any material until much later. By early 1999, Rust Epique, James Bradley Jr. (a.k.a. JBJ), Doug Miller, Adam Goldstein (a.k.a. DJ AM), and Antonio Lorenzo "Trouble" Valli joined the band. Prior to joining the band, Bradley was the drummer for jazz trumpeter Chuck Mangione from 1977 to 1981, and had been a member of the alternative rock band Mary's Danish in the early 1990s. Crazy Town's debut album, "The Gift of Game", was released in November 1999, having been recorded earlier that year.


title: Crazy Town

text: The release of "The Gift of Game" was followed by a tour support slot for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Guitarist Rust Epique left the band while the album was being mixed, and Crazy Town was joined by Kraig Tyler shortly after. The first two singles from "The Gift of Game", "Toxic" and "Darkside", were released but failed to chart.


title: Crazy Town

text: In 2000, Crazy Town was signed to tour with Ozzfest; however, they were forced to withdraw after only two weeks when Binzer was arrested after he threw a chair through a window while he was drunk. Crazy Town then released their third single in 2001, "Butterfly" (which uses samples from Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Pretty Little Ditty"). It reached number 1 on the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart. Soundscan reports 100,000 album sales of "The Gift of Game" prior to the release of "Butterfly"; after "Butterfly" reached number 1, sales exceeded 1.5 million.


title: Crazy Town

text: Crazy Town toured with Ozzfest in 2001. They were received with mixed reviews; many people in the Ozzfest crowd mockingly called them "The Butterfly Boys". A fourth single, "Revolving Door", was released with limited success. In 2001 Crazy Town also made a cameo appearance in the music video for "Bad Boy for Life" by P. Diddy, Black Rob and Mark Curry.


title: Crazy Town

text: Their second album, "Darkhorse", was produced by Howard Benson and released on November 12, 2002. Benson's influence resulted in a more rock oriented sound. Prior to recording the album, drummer James Bradley Jr. eventually left the band and was replaced by Kyle Hollinger. The album achieved little commercial success, spawning only two singles: "Drowning", which became a minor hit in the US, UK, Austria and Germany, and "Hurt You So Bad", which failed to chart at all. Shortly after the release of "Darkhorse" the band broke up in 2003, citing amongst other things, pressure from their record company for a "Butterfly" follow-up.


title: Crazy Town

text: During Crazy Town's hiatus, Bret Mazur went on to form "The Pharmacy", a record-producing company. Shortly after leaving Crazy Town, Rust Epique formed a band which would eventually go by the name pre)Thing. He died of a heart attack shortly before their debut album "22nd Century Lifestyle" was released in 2004. Binzer contributed vocals to Paul Oakenfold's 2002 single "Starry Eyed Surprise". He released his first solo album in 2004, "Happy Love Sick", under his alias Shifty Shellshock. Kraig Tyler joined Eric Powell's industrial band "16Volt".


title: Crazy Town

text: In late 2007, Crazy Town announced that the remaining members had reformed and were working on a new studio album, tentatively titled "Crazy Town is Back", which would be released sometime in 2008, though no such release was ever made. On August 26, 2009, Crazy Town performed at Les Deux, in Hollywood, California, on stage together for the first time in five years. On August 28, 2009, former member DJ AM was found dead in his apartment, of an accidental drug overdose. On August 7, 2010, Crazy Town played together at the festival "SRH FEST 2010" in California. Throughout 2011, Crazy Town released a new song, "My Place", on YouTube, as well as two new songs, "Hard to Get" and "Hit That Switch", on their Myspace page.


title: Crazy Town

text: In 2013, Shifty and Epic said that Crazy Town were in the studio recording a new album, entitled "The Brimstone Sluggers". On December 18, 2014, Crazy Town released their first official single from the album, "Megatron". The song was used as the theme song for "Impact Wrestling" during its run on Destination America in 2015.


title: Crazy Town

text: "The Brimstone Sluggers" was released on August 28, 2015. DJ AM appears as a featured artist on the track "Born to Raise Hell", which was released as a single in August 2015. In 2016, lead guitarist was added to the lineup and from August till October 2016, the band toured with the Make America Rock Again concert, alongside other artists who had success throughout the 2000s. Throughout the tour, Epic would perform and was temporarily replaced by Bobby Reeves, an ex-vocalist of Adema.


title: Crazy Town

text: In January 2017, after a year of hiatus from the band, Epic announced through his Facebook post that he will no longer tour with the band. Epic intends to still be involved with Crazy Town, though not as a band member. Following Mazur's departure, Rick Dixon, Nick Diiorio and Kevin Kapler also left the band in early April. Shifty decided to add an "X" next to the band's name. When asked about the letter's significance on their Instagram account, the band stated "the X is used by gangs to symbolize a territory that has just been won".


title: Crazy Town

text: On November 3, 2019, Crazy Town's van crashed into a moose during a tour stop in Ontario, Canada. Seth Binzer, Elias Tannous and Roland Banks were treated for bruises and cuts at the hospital.


title: Crazy Town

text: Crazy Town has been noted by journalists and the group itself for its hip hop sound. Their music has also been labeled as rap rock, rap metal, nu metal, and alternative rock. As of 2014, Crazy Town does not consider itself to be a rock band, but rather a hip hop group.


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: Bronchopneumonia is a subtype of pneumonia. It is the acute inflammation of the bronchi, accompanied by inflamed patches in the nearby lobules of the lungs.


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: It is often contrasted with lobar pneumonia; but, in clinical practice, the types are difficult to apply, as the patterns usually overlap. Bronchopneumonia (lobular) often leads to lobar pneumonia as the infection progresses. The same organism may cause one type of pneumonia in one patient, and another in a different patient.


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: It is more commonly a hospital-acquired pneumonia than a community-acquired pneumonia, in contrast to lobar pneumonia.


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: Bronchopneumonia is less likely than lobar pneumonia to be associated with "Streptococcus pneumoniae". Rather, the bronchopneumonia pattern has been associated mainly with the following: "Staphylococcus aureus", "Klebsiella", "E. coli" and "Pseudomonas".


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: On gross pathology there are typically multiple foci of consolidation present in the basal lobes of the human lung, often bilateral. These lesions are 2–4 cm in diameter, grey-yellow, dry, often centered on a bronchiole, poorly delimited, and with the tendency to confluence, especially in children.


title: Bronchopneumonia

text: Compared to pneumonia in general, the association between the bronchopneumonia pattern and hospital-acquired pneumonia warrants greater consideration of multiple drug resistance in the choice of antibiotics.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana ( or PM-JAY";" also referred to as Ayushman Bharat National Health Protection Scheme or NHPS) is a national public health insurance fund of the Government of India that aims to provide free access to health insurance coverage for low income earners in the country. Roughly, the bottom 50% of the country qualifies for this scheme. People using the program access their own primary care services from a family doctor. When anyone needs additional care, then PM-JAY provides free secondary health care for those needing specialist treatment and tertiary health care for those requiring hospitalization.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: The programme is part of the Indian government's National Health Policy and is means-tested. It was launched in September 2018 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. That ministry later established the National Health Authority as an organization to administer the program. It is a centrally sponsored scheme and is jointly funded by both the union government and the states. By offering services to 50 crore (500 million) people it is the world's largest government sponsored healthcare program. The program is a means-tested as its users are people with low income in India.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: In 2017 an Indian version of the Global Burden of Disease Study reported major diseases and risk factors from 1990 to 2016 for every state in India. This study brought a lot of interest in government health policy because it identified major health challenges which the government could address. In 2018 the Indian government described that every year, more than six crores Indians were pushed into poverty because of out of pocket medical expenses. Despite various available regional and national programs for healthcare in India, there was much more to be done. The Indian government first announced the Ayushman Bharat Yojana as a universal health care plan in February 2018 in the 2018 Union budget of India. The Union Council of Ministers approved it in March. In his 2018 Independence Day speech Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that India would have a major national health program later that year on 25 September, also commemorating the birthday of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: In June 2018 the applications opened for hospitals through an "empanelment process". In July 2018, the Ayushman Bharat Yojana recommended that people access benefits through Aadhaar, but also said that there was a process for people to access without that identity card. AB PM-JAY was first launched on 23 September 2018 at Ranchi, Jharkhand. By 26 December 2020 the scheme was extended to the Union Territories of Jammu Kashmir and Ladakh. The program has been called "ambitious".


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: Features of PM-JAY include the following— providing health coverage for 10 crores households or 50 crores Indians; providing a cover of per family per year for medical treatment in empaneled hospitals, both public and private; offering cashless payment and paperless recordkeeping through the hospital or doctor's office; using criteria from the Socio Economic and Caste Census 2011 to determine eligibility for benefits; no restriction on family size, age or gender; all previous medical conditions are covered under the scheme; it covers 3 days of pre-hospitalisation and 15 days of post-hospitalisation, including diagnostic care and expenses on medicines; the scheme is portable and a beneficiary can avail medical treatment at any PM-JAY empanelled hospital outside their state and anywhere in the country; providing access to free COVID-19 testing.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: India's 28 states and 8 union territories each make their own choice about whether to participate in Ayushman Bharat Yojana. In February 2018 when the program was announced 20 states committed to join. In September 2018 shortly after launch some states and territories declined to participate in the program. Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu initially declined to join because they each had their own state healthcare programmes. Those programs, Mahatma Jyotiba Phule Jan Arogya Yojana and the programme for Tamil Nadu, were already functioning well. These states later both joined Ayushman Bharat Yojana with special exceptions to make it part of their existing infrastructure. In a similar way, Kerala, despite having its own health program agreed to begin using Ayushman Bharat Yogana from November 2019. West Bengal initially joined the program but then opted out in favor of establishing their own regional health programme. Telangana did the same. By January 2020 Odisha had not joined the scheme. In March 2020 Delhi announced that it would join the program.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: In May 2020 Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in his radio show "Mann Ki Baat" that the Ayushman Bharat scheme had recently benefited more than one crore people. By May 2020, the scheme had provided more than 1 crore treatments with a value of crore. The number of public and private hospitals empanelled nationwide stands at 24,432. The Ayushman Bharat Yojana programme announced a special collaboration with the Employees' State Insurance programme in November 2019. From June 2020, the program had entered a pilot to cover 120,000 workers with that insurance at 15 hospitals.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: When Ayushman Bharat Yojana began there were questions of how to reconcile its plans with other existing health development recommendations, such as from NITI Aayog. A major challenge of implementing a national health care scheme would be starting with infrastructure in need of development to be part of a modern national system. While Ayushman Bharat Yojana seeks to provide excellent healthcare, India still has some basic healthcare challenges including relatively few doctors, more cases of infectious disease, and a national budget with a comparatively low central government investment in health care. Some of the problems lay outside the Health Ministry such as urban development or transport. While many government hospitals have joined the program, many private corporate hospitals have not. The private hospitals report that they would be unable to offer their special services at the government low price, even with a government subsidy.


title: Ayushman Bharat Yojana

text: There has been misuse of the Ayushman Bharat scheme by private hospitals through submission of fake medical bills. Under the Scheme, surgeries have been claimed to be performed on persons who had been discharged long ago and dialysis has been shown as performed at hospitals not having kidney transplant facility. There are at least 697 fake cases in Uttarakhand State alone, where fine of has been imposed on hospitals for frauds under the Scheme. Initial analysis of high-value claims under PMJAY has revealed that a relatively small number of districts and hospitals account for a high number of these, and some hint of an anti-women bias, with male patients getting more coverage. Despite all efforts to curb foul-play, the risk of unscrupulous private entities profiteering from gaming the system is clearly present in AB-PMJAY.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; , lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. The Masoretic Text defines the Jewish canon and its precise letter-text, with its vocalization and accentuation known as the "mas'sora". Referring to the Masoretic Text, "mesorah" specifically means the diacritic markings of the text of the Hebrew scriptures and the concise in manuscripts (and later printings) of the Tanakh which note textual details, usually about the precise spelling of words. It was primarily copied, edited and distributed by a group of Jews known as the Masoretes between the 7th and 10th centuries of the Common Era (CE). The oldest known complete copy, the Leningrad Codex, dates from the early 11th century CE.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The differences attested to in the Dead Sea Scrolls indicate that multiple versions of the Hebrew scriptures already existed by the end of the Second Temple period. Which is closest to a theoretical Urtext is disputed, as is whether such a singular text ever existed. The Dead Sea Scrolls, dating to as early as the 3rd century BCE, contain versions of the text that are radically different from today's Hebrew Bible. The Septuagint (a Koine Greek translation made in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE) and the Peshitta (a Syriac translation made in the 2nd century CE) occasionally present notable differences from the Masoretic Text, as does the Samaritan Pentateuch, the text of the Torah preserved by the Samaritans in Samaritan Hebrew. Fragments of an ancient manuscript of the Book of Leviticus found near an ancient synagogue's Torah ark in Ein Gedi have identical wording to the Masoretic Text.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Masoretic Text is the basis for most Protestant translations of the Old Testament such as the King James Version, English Standard Version, New American Standard Version, and New International Version. After 1943, it has also been used for some Catholic Bibles, such as the New American Bible and the New Jerusalem Bible. Some Christian denominations instead prefer translations of the Septuagint as it matches quotations in the New Testament.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The oldest manuscript fragments of the final Masoretic Text, including vocalications and the masorah, date from around the 9th century. The oldest-known complete copy, the Leningrad Codex, dates from the early 11th century. The "Aleppo Codex", once the oldest-known complete copy but missing large sections since the 1947 Civil war in Palestine, dates from the 10th century. However codification of the base consonants appears to have begun earlier, perhaps even in the Second Temple period.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Talmud and Karaite manuscripts state that a standard copy of the Hebrew Bible was kept in the court of the Temple in Jerusalem for the benefit of copyists; there were paid correctors of biblical books among the officers of the Temple (Talmud, tractate Ketubot 106a). This copy is mentioned in the Letter of Aristeas (§ 30; comp. Blau, "Studien zum Althebr. Buchwesen", p. 100), in the statements of Philo (preamble to his "Analysis of the Political Constitution of the Jews"), and in Josephus ("Contra Ap." i. 8).


title: Masoretic Text

text: A Talmudic story, perhaps referring to an earlier time, relates that three Torah scrolls were found in the Temple court but were at variance with each other. The differences between the three were then resolved by majority decision.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran, dating from , shows that in this period there was no uniform text. According to Menachem Cohen, the Dead Sea scrolls showed that "there was indeed a Hebrew text-type on which the Septuagint-translation was based and which differed substantially from the received MT." The scrolls show numerous small variations in orthography, both as against the later Masoretic Text, and between each other. It is also evident from the notings of corrections and of variant alternatives that scribes felt free to choose according to their personal taste and discretion between different readings.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The text of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Peshitta read somewhat in-between the Masoretic Text and the old Greek. However, despite these variations, most of the Qumran fragments can be classified as being closer to the Masoretic Text than to any other text group that has survived. According to Lawrence Schiffman, 60% can be classed as being of proto-Masoretic type, and a further 20% Qumran style with a basis in proto-Masoretic texts, compared to 5% proto-Samaritan type, 5% Septuagintal type, and 10% non-aligned. Joseph Fitzmyer noted the following regarding the findings at Qumran Cave 4 in particular: "Such ancient recensional forms of Old Testament books bear witness to an unsuspected textual diversity that once existed; these texts merit far greater study and attention than they have been accorded till now. Thus, the differences in the Septuagint are no longer considered the result of a poor or tendentious attempt to translate the Hebrew into the Greek; rather they testify to a different pre-Christian form of the Hebrew text". On the other hand, some of the fragments conforming most accurately to the Masoretic Text were found in Cave 4.


title: Masoretic Text

text: An emphasis on minute details of words and spellings, already used among the Pharisees as basis for argumentation, reached its height with the example of Rabbi Akiva (died 135 CE). The idea of a perfect text sanctified in its consonantal base quickly spread throughout the Jewish communities via supportive statements in Halakha, Aggadah, and Jewish thought; and with it increasingly forceful strictures that a deviation in even a single letter would make a Torah scroll invalid. Very few manuscripts are said to have survived the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. This drastically reduced the number of variants in circulation and also gave a new urgency that the text must be preserved. Few manuscripts survive from this era, but a short Leviticus fragment recovered from the ancient En-Gedi Scroll, carbon-dated to the 3rd or 4th century CE, is completely identical to the consonantal Masoretic Text preserved today.


title: Masoretic Text

text: New Greek translations were also made. Unlike the Septuagint, large-scale deviations in sense between the Greek of Aquila of Sinope and Theodotion and what we now know as the Masoretic Text are minimal. Relatively small variations between different Hebrew texts in use still clearly existed though, as witnessed by differences between the present-day Masoretic Text and versions mentioned in the Gemara, and often even halachic midrashim based on spelling versions which do not exist in the current Masoretic Text.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The current received text finally achieved predominance through the reputation of the Masoretes, schools of scribes and Torah scholars working between the 7th and 11th centuries, based primarily in the cities of Tiberias, Jerusalem, and in Babylonia under the Rashidun, Umayyad, and Abbasid Caliphates. According to Menachem Cohen, these schools developed such prestige for the accuracy and error-control of their copying techniques that their texts established an authority beyond all others. Differences remained, sometimes bolstered by systematic local differences in pronunciation and cantillation. Every locality, following the tradition of its school, had a standard codex embodying its readings. In Babylonia, the school of Sura differed from that of Nehardea; and similar differences existed in the schools of Palestine as against that at Tiberias, which in later times increasingly became the chief seat of learning. In this period living tradition ceased, and the Masoretes in preparing their codices usually followed one school or the other, examining, however, standard codices of other schools and noting their differences.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Masorah for the most part ended in the 10th century with Aaron ben Moses ben Asher and Ben Naphtali who were the leading Masoretes of the time. Ben Asher wrote a standard codex (the "Aleppo Codex") embodying his opinions. Ben Naphtali likely did as well, though it has not survived. However, the differences between the two are found in more or less complete Masoretic lists and in quotations in David Ḳimḥi, Norzi, and other medieval writers.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The differences between Ben Naphtali and Ben Asher number about 875, nine-tenths of which refer to the placing of the accents, while the rest relate to vowels and consonantal spelling. The differences between the two Masoretes do not represent solely personal opinions; the two rivals represent different schools. Like the Ben Ashers there seem to have been several Ben Naftalis. The Masoretic lists often do not agree on the precise nature of the differences between the two rival authorities; it is, therefore, impossible to define with exactness their differences in every case; and it is probably due to this fact that the received text does not follow uniformly the system of either Ben Asher or Ben Naphtali.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Ben Asher was the last of a distinguished family of Masoretes extending back to the latter half of the 8th century. Despite the rivalry of ben Naphtali and the opposition of Saadia Gaon, the most eminent representative of the Babylonian school of criticism, ben Asher's codex became recognized as the standard text of the Hebrew Bible. Notwithstanding all this, for reasons unknown neither the printed text nor any manuscript which has been preserved is based entirely on Ben Asher: they are all eclectic. Aside from Ben Asher and Ben Naphtali, the names of several other Masorites have come down; but, perhaps with the exception of one—Phinehas, the head of the academy, who is supposed by modern scholars to have lived about 750—neither their time, their place, nor their connection with the various schools is known.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Most scholars conclude that Aaron ben Asher was a Karaite, though there is evidence against this view.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The two rival authorities, ben Asher and ben Naphtali, practically brought the Masorah to a close. Very few additions were made by the later Masoretes, styled in the 13th and 14th centuries Naḳdanim, who revised the works of the copyists, added the vowels and accents (generally in fainter ink and with a finer pen) and frequently the Masorah.


title: Masoretic Text

text: During the 11th, 12th, and 13th centuries the Franco-German school of Tosafists influenced in the development and spread of Masoretic literature. Rabbi Gershom ben Judah, his brother Machir ben Judah, Joseph ben Samuel Bonfils (Tob 'Elem) of Limoges, Rabbeinu Tam (Jacob ben Meïr), Menahem ben Perez of Joigny, Perez ben Elijah of Corbeil, Marne, Judah ben Isaac Messer Leon, Meïr Spira, and Rabbi Meir of Rothenburg made Masoretic compilations, or additions to the subject, which are all more or less frequently referred to in the marginal glosses of biblical codices and in the works of Hebrew grammarians.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Traditionally, a ritual Sefer Torah (Torah scroll) could contain only the Hebrew consonantal text – nothing added, nothing taken away. The Masoretic codices however, provide extensive additional material, called "masorah", to show correct pronunciation and cantillation, protect against scribal errors, and annotate possible variants. The manuscripts thus include vowel points, pronunciation marks and stress accents in the text, short annotations in the side margins, and longer more extensive notes in the upper and lower margins and collected at the end of each book.


title: Masoretic Text

text: These notes were added because the Masoretes recognized the possibility of human error in copying the Hebrew Bible. The Masoretes were not working with the original Hebrew manuscripts of the Bible and corruptions had already crept into the versions they copied.


title: Masoretic Text

text: From the Hebrew word "masorah" "tradition""." Originally "masoret", a word found in Book of Ezekiel 20:37 (there from אסר "to bind" for "fetters").


title: Masoretic Text

text: According to the majority of scholars, including Wilhelm Bacher, the form of the Ezekiel word "masoret" "fetters" was applied by the Masoretes to the מסר root meaning "to transmit", for "masoret" "tradition." (See also .)


title: Masoretic Text

text: Later, the text was also called "moseirah", by a direct conjugation of מסר "to transmit," and the synthesis of the two forms produced the modern word "masorah."


title: Masoretic Text

text: According to a minority of scholars, including Caspar Levias, the intent of the Masoretes was "masoret" "fetter [upon the exposition of the text]", and the word was only later connected to מסר and translated "tradition".


title: Masoretic Text

text: Samuel David Luzzatto argued that "masoret" was a synonym for "siman" by extended meaning ("transmission[ of the sign]" became "transmitted sign") and referred to the symbols used in vocalizing and punctuating the text.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Ze'ev Ben-Haim argued "masoret" meant "counting" and was later conjugated "moseirah" "thing which is counted", referring to the Masoretic counts of the letters, words, and verses in the Bible, discussed Qiddushin 30a.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The language of the Masoretic notes is primarily Aramaic but partly Hebrew. The Masoretic annotations are found in various forms: (a) in separate works, e.g., the "Oklah we-Oklah"; (b) in the form of notes written in the margins and at the end of codices. In rare cases, the notes are written between the lines. The first word of each biblical book is also as a rule surrounded by notes. The latter are called the Initial Masorah; the notes on the side margins or between the columns are called the Small ("Masora parva" or Mp) or Inner Masorah (Masora marginalis); and those on the lower and upper margins, the Large or Outer Masorah ("Masora magna" or Mm[Mas.M]). The name "Large Masorah" is applied sometimes to the lexically arranged notes at the end of the printed Bible, usually called the Final Masorah, ("Masora finalis"), or the Masoretic Concordance.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Small Masorah consists of brief notes with reference to marginal readings, to statistics showing the number of times a particular form is found in Scripture, to full and defective spelling, and to abnormally written letters. The Large Masorah is more copious in its notes. The Final Masorah comprises all the longer rubrics for which space could not be found in the margin of the text, and is arranged alphabetically in the form of a concordance. The quantity of notes the marginal Masorah contains is conditioned by the amount of vacant space on each page. In the manuscripts it varies also with the rate at which the copyist was paid and the fanciful shape he gave to his gloss.


title: Masoretic Text

text: In most manuscripts, there are some discrepancies between the text and the masorah, suggesting that they were copied from different sources or that one of them has copying errors. The lack of such discrepancies in the "Aleppo Codex" is one of the reasons for its importance; the scribe who copied the notes, presumably Aaron ben Moses ben Asher, probably wrote them originally.


title: Masoretic Text

text: In classical antiquity, copyists were paid for their work according to the number of s (lines of verse). As the prose books of the Bible were hardly ever written in stichs, the copyists, in order to estimate the amount of work, had to count the letters. According to some this was (also) to ensure accuracy in the transmission of the text with the production of subsequent copies that were done by hand.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Hence the Masoretes contributed the Numerical Masorah. These notes are traditionally categorized into two main groups, the marginal Masorah and the final Masorah. The category of marginal Masorah is further divided into the "Masorah parva" (small Masorah) in the outer side margins and the "Masorah magna" (large Masorah), traditionally located at the top and bottom margins of the text. The "Masorah parva" is a set of statistics in the outer side margins of the text. Beyond simply counting the letters, the "Masorah parva" consists of word-use statistics, similar documentation for expressions or certain phraseology, observations on full or defective writing, references to the Kethiv-Qere readings and more. These observations are also the result of a passionate zeal to safeguard the accurate transmission of the sacred text.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Even though often cited as very exact, the Masoretic "frequency notes" in the margin of "Codex Leningradiensis" contain several errors.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The "Masorah magna", in measure, is an expanded "Masorah parva". "Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia" (BHS) includes an apparatus referring the reader to the large Masorah, which is printed separately.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The final Masorah is located at the end of biblical books or after certain sections of the text, such as at the end of the Torah. It contains information and statistics regarding the number of words in a book or section, etc. Thus, Book of Leviticus 8:23 is the middle verse in the Pentateuch. The collation of manuscripts and the noting of their differences furnished material for the Text-Critical Masorah. The close relation which existed in earlier times (from the Soferim to the Amoraim inclusive) between the teacher of tradition and the Masorete, both frequently being united in one person, accounts for the Exegetical Masorah. Finally, the invention and introduction of a graphic system of vocalization and accentuation gave rise to the Grammatical Masorah.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The most important of the Masoretic notes are those that detail the Qere and Ketiv that are located in the "Masorah parva" in the outside margins of BHS. Given that the Masoretes would not alter the sacred consonantal text, the Kethiv-Qere notes were a way of "correcting" or commenting on the text for any number of reasons (grammatical, theological, aesthetic, etc.) deemed important by the copyist.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The earliest tasks of the Masoretes included a standard division of the text into books, sections, paragraphs, verses, and clauses; fixing of the orthography, pronunciation, and cantillation; introduction or final adoption of the square characters with the five final letters; some textual changes to guard against blasphemy (though these changes may pre-date the Masoretes – see "Tikkune Soferim" below); enumeration of letters, words, verses, etc., and the substitution of some words for others in public reading.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Since no additions were allowed to be made to the official text of the Bible, the early Masoretes adopted other methods: e.g., they marked the various divisions by spacing, and gave indications of halakic and haggadic teachings by full or defective spelling, abnormal forms of letters, dots, and other signs. Marginal notes were permitted only in private copies, and the first mention of such notes is found in the case of R. Meïr (c. 100–150 CE).


title: Masoretic Text

text: Early rabbinic sources, from around 200 CE, mention several passages of Scripture in which the conclusion is inevitable that the ancient reading must have differed from that of the present text. The explanation of this phenomenon is given in the expression "Scripture has used euphemistic language" (), i.e. to avoid anthropomorphism and anthropopathism.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Rabbi Simon ben Pazzi (3rd century) calls these readings "emendations of the Scribes" ("tikkune Soferim"; Midrash Genesis Rabbah xlix. 7), assuming that the Scribes actually made the changes. This view was adopted by the later Midrash and by the majority of Masoretes. In Masoretic works these changes are ascribed to Ezra; to Ezra and Nehemiah; to Ezra and the Soferim; or to Ezra, Nehemiah, Zechariah, Haggai, and Baruch. All these ascriptions mean one and the same thing: that the changes were assumed to have been made by the Men of the Great Synagogue.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The term "tikkun Soferim" () has been understood by different scholars in various ways. Some regard it as a correction of biblical language authorized by the Soferim for homiletical purposes. Others take it to mean a mental change made by the original writers or redactors of Scripture; i.e. the latter shrank from putting in writing a thought which some of the readers might expect them to express.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Among the earliest technical terms used in connection with activities of the Scribes are the "mikra Soferim" and "ittur Soferim". In the geonic schools, the first term was taken to signify certain vowel-changes which were made in words in pause or after the article; the second, the cancellation in a few passages of the "vav" conjunctive, where it had been wrongly read by some. The objection to such an explanation is that the first changes would fall under the general head of fixation of pronunciation, and the second under the head of "Qere" and "Ketiv" (i.e. "What is read" and "What is written"). Various explanations have, therefore, been offered by ancient as well as modern scholars without, however, succeeding in furnishing a completely satisfactory solution.


title: Masoretic Text

text: There are four words having one of their letters suspended above the line. One of them, משה, is due to an alteration of the original משה out of reverence for Moses; rather than say that Moses's grandson became an idolatrous priest, a suspended letter nun ( נ ) was inserted to turn Mosheh into Menasheh (Manasseh). The origin of the other three is doubtful. According to some, they are due to mistaken majuscular letters; according to others, they are later insertions of originally omitted weak consonants.


title: Masoretic Text

text: In fifteen passages within the Bible, some words are stigmatized; i.e., dots appear above the letters. The significance of the dots is disputed. Some hold them to be marks of erasure; others believe them to indicate that in some collated manuscripts the stigmatized words were missing, hence that the reading is doubtful; still others contend that they are merely a mnemonic device to indicate homiletic explanations which the ancients had connected with those words; finally, some maintain that the dots were designed to guard against the omission by copyists of text-elements which, at first glance or after comparison with parallel passages, seemed to be superfluous. Instead of dots some manuscripts exhibit strokes, vertical or else horizontal. The first two explanations are unacceptable for the reason that such faulty readings would belong to Qere and Ketiv, which, in case of doubt, the majority of manuscripts would decide. The last two theories have equal probability.


title: Masoretic Text

text: In nine passages of the Masoretic Text are found signs usually called inverted nuns, because they resemble the Hebrew letter nun ( נ ) written in some inverted fashion. The exact shape varies between different manuscripts and printed editions. In many manuscripts, a reversed nun is found referred to as a "nun hafucha" by the masoretes. In some earlier printed editions, they are shown as the standard nun upside down or rotated, because the printer did not want to bother to design a character to be used only nine times. The recent scholarly editions of the Masoretic Text show the reversed nun as described by the masoretes. In some manuscripts, however, other symbols are occasionally found instead. These are sometimes referred to in rabbinical literature as "simaniyot" (markers).


title: Masoretic Text

text: The primary set of inverted nuns is found surrounding the text of Numbers 10:35–36. The Mishna notes that this text is 85 letters long and dotted. This demarcation of this text leads to the later use of the inverted nun markings. Saul Lieberman demonstrated that similar markings can be found in ancient Greek texts where they are also used to denote 'short texts'. During the Medieval period, the inverted nuns were actually inserted into the text of the early Rabbinic Bibles published by Bomberg in the early 16th century. The talmud records that the markings surrounding Numbers 10:35-36 were thought to denote that this 85 letter text was not in its proper place.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Bar Kappara considered the Torah known to us as composed of seven volumes in the Gemara "The seven pillars with which Wisdom built her house (Prov. 9:1) are the seven Books of Moses". Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus and Deuteronomy as we know them but Numbers was really three separate volumes: Numbers 1:1–10:35 followed by Numbers 10:35–36 and the third text from there to the end of Numbers.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The 85 letter text is also said to be denoted because it is the model for the fewest letters which constitute a 'text' which one would be required to save from fire due to its holiness.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The history of the Masorah may be divided into three periods: (1) creative period, from its beginning to the introduction of vowel-signs; (2) reproductive period, from the introduction of vowel-signs to the printing of the Masorah (1525); (3) critical period, from 1525 to the present time.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The materials for the history of the first period are scattered remarks in Talmudic and Midrashic literature, in the post-Talmudical treatises "Masseket Sefer Torah" and "Masseket Soferim", and in a Masoretic chain of tradition found in ben Asher's "Diḳduḳe ha-Ṭe'amim," § 69 and elsewhere.


title: Masoretic Text

text: Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah, having collated a vast number of manuscripts, systematized his material and arranged the Masorah in the second Bomberg edition of the Bible (Venice, 1524–1525). Besides introducing the Masorah into the margin, he compiled at the close of his Bible a concordance of the Masoretic glosses for which he could not find room in a marginal form, and added an elaborate introduction – the first treatise on the Masorah ever produced. Due to its wide distribution, and in spite of its many errors, this work is frequently considered as the "textus receptus" of the Masorah. It was also used for the English translation of the Old Testament for the King James Version (though not always followed).


title: Masoretic Text

text: Next to Ibn Adoniyah, the critical study of the Masorah has been most advanced by Elia Levita, who published his famous "Massoret ha-Massoret" in 1538. The "Tiberias" of the elder Johannes Buxtorf (1620) made Levita's researches more accessible to a Christian audience. The eighth introduction to Walton's Polyglot Bible is largely a reworking of the "Tiberias". Levita compiled likewise a vast Masoretic concordance, "Sefer ha-Zikronot", which still lies in the National Library at Paris unpublished. The study is indebted also to R. Meïr b. Todros ha-Levi (RaMaH), who, as early as the 13th century, wrote his "Sefer Massoret Seyag la-Torah" (correct ed. Florence, 1750); to Menahem Lonzano, who composed a treatise on the Masorah of the Pentateuch entitled "Or Torah"; and in particular to Jedidiah Norzi, whose "Minḥat Shai" contains valuable Masoretic notes based on a careful study of manuscripts.


title: Masoretic Text

text: The Dead Sea Scrolls have shed new light on the history of the Masoretic Text. Many texts found there, especially those from Masada, are quite similar to the Masoretic Text, suggesting that an ancestor of the Masoretic Text was indeed extant as early as the 2nd century BCE. However, other texts, including many of those from Qumran, differ substantially, indicating that the Masoretic Text was but one of a diverse set of biblical writings (Lane Fox 1991:99–106; Tov 1992:115). Among the rejected books by both the Judaic and Catholic canons was found the Book of Enoch, the Community Rule (1QS), and War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness (1QM).


title: Masoretic Text

text: In a recent finding, a scroll fragment was found to be identical to the Masoretic Text. The approximately 1,700-year-old En-Gedi Scroll was found in 1970 but had not had its contents reconstructed until 2016. Researchers were able to recover 35 complete and partial lines of text from the Book of Leviticus and the text they deciphered is completely identical with the consonantal framework of the Masoretic Text. The En-Gedi scroll is the first biblical scroll to have been discovered in the holy ark of an ancient synagogue, where it would have been stored for prayers, and not in desert caves like the Dead Sea Scrolls.


title: Masoretic Text

text: There have been very many published editions of the Masoretic Text, some of the most important being:


title: Nortel

text: Nortel Networks Corporation (Nortel), formerly Northern Telecom Limited, was a Canadian multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturer headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in Montreal, Quebec, in 1895 as the Northern Electric and Manufacturing Company. Until an antitrust settlement in 1949, Northern Electric was owned principally by Bell Canada and the Western Electric Company of the Bell System, producing large volumes of telecommunication equipment based on licensed Western Electric designs.


title: Nortel

text: At its height, Nortel accounted for more than a third of the total valuation of all companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX), employing 94,500 people worldwide. In 2009, Nortel filed for bankruptcy protection in Canada and the United States, triggering a 79% decline of its corporate stock price. The bankruptcy case was the largest in Canadian history and left pensioners, shareholders and former employees with enormous losses. By 2016, Nortel had sold billions of dollars in assets. Courts in the U.S. and Canada approved a negotiated settlement of bankruptcy proceedings in 2017.


title: Nortel

text: Alexander Graham Bell conceived the technical aspects of the telephone and invented it in July 1874, while residing with his parents at their farm in Tutela Heights, on the outskirts of Brantford, Ontario. He later refined its design at Brantford after producing his first working prototype in Boston. Canada's first telephone factory, created by James Cowherd of Brantford, was a three-story brick building that soon started manufacturing telephones for the Bell System, leading to the city's style as "The Telephone City".


title: Nortel

text: After Cowherd's death in 1881 which resulted in the closure of his Brantford factory, a mechanical production department was created within the Bell Telephone Company of Canada and production of Canadian telephone equipment was transferred to Montreal in 1882, to compensate the restrictions on importing telephone equipment from the United States. In addition to telephones, four years later, the department started manufacturing switchboards, at first the 50-line Standard Magneto Switchboard. The small manufacturing department expanded yearly with the growth and popularity of the telephone to 50 employees in 1888. By 1890 it had been transformed into its own branch of operations with 200 employees, and a new factory was under construction.


title: Nortel

text: As the manufacturing branch expanded, its production ability increased beyond the demand for telephones, and it faced closure for several months a year without manufacturing other products. The Bell Telephone Company of Canada's (later renamed to Bell Canada) charter prohibited the company to build other products. In 1895, the Bell Telephone of Canada spun off its manufacturing arm to build telephones for sale to other companies, as well as other products, such as fire alarm boxes, police street call boxes, and fire department call equipment. This company was incorporated as the Northern Electric and Manufacturing Company Limited.


title: Nortel

text: Northern Electric and Manufacturing Company Limited were incorporated on December 7, 1895. The initial stock capital was $50,000 at $100 per share, with 93% held by the Bell Telephone Company of Canada and the remainder held by seven corporate directors. The first general stockholders meeting was held on March 24, 1896.


title: Nortel

text: In December 1899, The Bell Telephone Company of Canada bought a cabling company for $500,000; a Canadian charter named it "The Wire and Cable Company". Northern Electric and Manufacturing further expanded its product line in 1900, manufacturing the first Canadian wind-up gramophones that played flat discs. In 1911 the Wire and Cable company changed its name to the "Imperial Wire and Cable Company".


title: Nortel

text: The construction of a new manufacturing plant started in 1913 at Shearer Street in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, as preparations began for the two manufacturing companies' integration. Then, in January 1914, the Northern Electric and Manufacturing Company and the Imperial Wire and Cable Company merged into the "Northern Electric Company", commonly known simply as Northern Electric. The new company opened the doors on a new manufacturing plant in January 1915. This facility, located on Shearer Street, was the primary manufacturing centre until the mid-1950s. Edward Fleetford Sise was the president and his brother Paul Fleetford Sise was the vice-president and general manager.


title: Nortel

text: During the First World War Northern Electric manufactured the Portable Commutator, a one-wire telegraphic switchboard for military operations in the field. In 1922, Northern started to produce, for $5, the "Peanut" vacuum tube, which required only a single dry-cell battery. The use of alternating current was still under development during this time. The "Northern Electric Peanut tube was the smallest tube made, and drew only one-tenth of an ampere and was the most remarkable radio frequency amplifier ever made." During the 1920s Northern Electric made kettles, toasters, cigar lighters, electric stoves, and washing machines. In January 1923, Northern Electric started to operate an AM radio station with call letters CHYC, in the Shearer Street plant, and much of the programming was religious services for the Northern Electric employees and families in the community. In July 1923, CHYC-AM was the first radio station to provide entertainment to the riders of the transcontinental train, in a parlor car fitted with a radio set to receive the broadcast as it left Montreal and traveled west. Later in the 1920s, Northern created the first talking movie sound system in the British Empire for a theater in Montreal.


title: Nortel

text: During the Great Depression in the 1930s, Northern Electric was affected, like most other companies. From the beginning of 1930 through the end of 1933, sales dropped from $34 million to $8.2 million, with employees dropping from 6,100 to 2,400.


title: Nortel

text: In 1949, an antitrust suit in the U.S. forced AT&T/Western Electric to sell its stake in Northern Electric to Bell Canada. AT&T spun off Northern Electric in 1956. Deprived of its Western Electric tie, Northern began developing its own products. In 1953, Northern Electric produced its first television sets using tubes made by RCA.


title: Nortel

text: Bell Canada acquired 100 percent of Northern Electric in 1964; through public stock offerings starting in 1973, Bell's ownership of Northern Electric and its successors would be reduced, though it continued to have majority control.


title: Nortel

text: In 1966, the Northern Electric research lab, Northern Electric Laboratories (the predecessor to Bell-Northern Research), started looking into the possibilities of fiber optic cable, and in 1969, began work on digitizing telephone communications. Also in 1969, Northern began making inroads into the U.S. market with its switching systems. In 1972, it opened its first factory in the U.S. in Michigan. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Northern began shipping its first digital switching systems, one of the earliest such systems to be sold.


title: Nortel

text: Northern Telecom was, with Bell-Northern Research, in the early 1970s a part owner of MicroSystems International, a semiconductor manufacturer based in Nepean, outside Ottawa.


title: Nortel

text: In March 1976, the company name was changed to Northern Telecom Limited, and management announced its intention to concentrate the company's efforts on digital technology. Northern Telecom was the first company in its industry to announce and to deliver a complete line of fully digital telecommunications products. The product line was branded "Digital World" and included the well known DMS-100, a fully digital central office switch serving as many as 100,000 lines, which was a key contributor to the company's revenue for close to 15 years.


title: Nortel

text: Starting in 1977, Nortel grew rapidly after the introduction of its DMS line of digital central office telephone switches, especially after the AT&T breakup in 1984. Northern Telecom became a significant supplier in Europe and China and was the first non-Japanese supplier to Nippon Telegraph and Telephone.


title: Nortel

text: In 1983, due to deregulation, Bell Canada Enterprises (later shortened to BCE) was formed as the parent company to Bell Canada and Northern Telecom. Bell-Northern Research was jointly owned 50–50 by Bell Canada and Northern Telecom. The combined three companies were referred to as the tricorporate.


title: Nortel

text: As Nortel, the streamlined identity it adopted for its 100th anniversary in 1995, the company set out to dominate the burgeoning global market for public and private networks.


title: Nortel

text: In 1998, with the acquisition of Bay Networks, the company's name was changed to Nortel Networks to emphasize its ability to provide complete solutions for multiprotocol, multiservice, global networking over the Internet and other communications networks. As a consequence of the stock transaction used to purchase Bay Networks, BCE ceased to be the majority shareholder of Nortel.


title: Nortel

text: In 2000, BCE spun out Nortel, distributing its holdings of Nortel to its shareholders. Bell-Northern Research was gradually absorbed into Nortel, as it first acquired a majority share in BNR, and eventually acquired the entire company.


title: Nortel

text: In the late 1990s, stock market speculators, hoping that Nortel would reap increasingly lucrative profits from the sale of fibre optic network gear, began pushing up the company's share price to unheard-of levels despite the company's repeated failure to turn a profit. Under the leadership of chief executive officer (CEO) John Roth, sales of optical equipment had been robust in the late 1990s, but the market was soon saturated. When the speculative telecom bubble of the late 1990s reached its pinnacle late in the year 2000, Nortel was to become one of the most spectacular casualties. Nortel's revenues would be dented by a saturated market and the failure of WorldCom, which was a major customer.


title: Nortel

text: At its height, Nortel accounted for more than a third of the total valuation of all the companies listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX), employing 94,500 worldwide, with 25,900 in Canada alone. Nortel's market capitalization fell from C$398 billion in September 2000 to less than C$5 billion in August 2002, as Nortel's stock price plunged from C$124 to C$0.47. When Nortel's stock crashed, it took with it a wide swath of Canadian investors and pension funds and left 60,000 Nortel employees unemployed. Roth was criticized after it was revealed that he cashed in his own stock options for a personal gain of C$135 million in 2000 alone.


title: Nortel

text: CEO John Roth retired in 2001. His planned successor and chief operating officer (COO), Clarence Chandran, already on sick leave due to complications following his 1997 stabbing in Singapore,


title: Nortel

text: decided to quit, however. Chief financial officer (CFO) Frank Dunn was eventually chosen as Roth's permanent replacement.


title: Nortel

text: Frank Dunn presided over a dramatic restructuring of Nortel, which included laying off two-thirds of its workforce (60,000 staff) and writedowns of nearly US$16 billion in 2001 alone. This had some initial perceived success in turning the company around, with an unexpected return to profitability reported in the first quarter of 2003. The black ink triggered a total of $70 million in bonuses to the top 43 managers, with $7.8 million going to Dunn alone, $3 million to chief financial officer Douglas Beatty, and $2 million to controller Michael Gollogly. Independent auditor Deloitte & Touche advised audit committee chairman John Cleghorn and board chairman "Red" Wilson to look into the suspicious results, who promptly hired the law firm WilmerHale to vet the financial statements. In late October 2003, Nortel announced that it intended to restate approximately $900 million of liabilities carried on its previously reported balance sheet as of June 30, 2003, following a comprehensive internal review of these liabilities. The company stated that the restatement's principal effects would be a reduction in previously reported net losses for 2000, 2001, and 2002 and an increase in shareholders' equity and net assets previously reported on its balance sheet. A dozen of the company's most senior executives returned $8.6 million of bonuses they were paid based on the erroneous accounting. Investigators ultimately found about $3 billion in revenue had been booked improperly in 1998, 1999, and 2000. More than $2 billion was moved into later years, about $750 million was pushed forward beyond 2003 and about $250 million was wiped away completely. The accounting scandal hurt both Nortel's reputation and finances, as Nortel spent an estimated US$400 million on outside auditors and management consultants to retrain staff.


title: Nortel

text: To improve its liquidity, in 2003 Nortel arranged a US$750 million credit support facility with Export Development Canada. Walter Robinson of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation denounced the line of credit, calling it "corporate welfare at its worst."


title: Nortel

text: On April 28, 2004 amidst the accounting scandal, three of Nortel's top lieutenants—Douglas Beatty, CEO Frank Dunn and Michael Gollogly—were fired for financial mismanagement. They were later charged with fraud by the RCMP. The trial began on January 16, 2012, ending with acquittals for all three.


title: Nortel

text: The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) also filed charges against them and four vice-presidents for civil fraud. On December 19, 2014, remaining civil charges from the Ontario Securities Commission and SEC were simultaneously dropped.


title: Nortel

text: After Dunn's firing, retired United States Admiral Bill Owens – at the time a member of the board of directors – was appointed interim CEO. Nortel Networks subsequently returned to using the Nortel name for branding purposes only (the official company name was not changed). Nortel acquired PEC Solutions, a provider of information technology and telecommunications services to various government agencies and departments, in June 2005 and renamed it Nortel Government Solutions Incorporated (NGS). LG Electronics and Nortel formed a joint venture in August, with Nortel owning 50% plus one share, to offer telecom and networking solutions in the wireline, optical, wireless and enterprise areas for South Korean and global customers.


title: Nortel

text: Peter W. Currie, previously the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the Royal Bank of Canada, was named CFO of Nortel in 2005, having previously served as Northern Telecom's CFO in the 1990s. Gary Daichendt, the former Chief Operating Officer of Cisco Systems, was hired as president and COO, and was expected to succeed Owens as CEO. Shortly afterward, Daichendt appointed ex-Cisco Chief Science Officer Gary Kunis as Chief Technology Officer (CTO). Both Garys were concerned about the overall direction of Nortel, especially when compared to Cisco, their previous employer. Just three months later, Daichendt resigned after both his restructuring plan and his suggestion that Owens and Currie leave the company immediately were rejected by the board of directors. Kunis quit shortly thereafter. At the year's end, directors Lynton "Red" Wilson and John Cleghorn retired from the board.


title: Nortel

text: In 2004 Nortel discovered that hackers they believed to be in China had free rein within the Nortel network for more than a decade before their collapse. The fall of Nortel coincided with the rise of Huawei.


title: Nortel

text: Mike S. Zafirovski, who had served as president and CEO of GE Lighting and then as Motorola President and COO, succeeded Owens as president and CEO on November 15, 2005. Motorola filed a suit against Zafirovski's hiring, alleging that his new position would break the terms of the non-disclosure agreement he had signed. Nortel agreed to pay $11.5 million on his behalf to settle the lawsuit. Nortel also paid out US$575 million and 629 million common shares in 2006 to settle a class-action lawsuit that accused the company of misleading investors about the company's health.


title: Nortel

text: Currie stepped down as Executive Vice President and CFO in early 2007. In February 2007, Nortel announced its plans to reduce its workforce by 2,000 employees, and to transfer an additional 1,000 jobs to lower-cost job sites. The Securities and Exchange Commission filed civil fraud charges against Nortel for accounting fraud from 2000 to 2003; the fraud was allegedly to close gaps between its true performance, its internal targets and Wall Street expectations. Nortel settled the case, paying $35 million, which the Commission distributed to affected shareholders, and reported periodically to the commission on remedial measures to improve its financial accounting.


title: Nortel

text: Nortel announced plans in February 2008 to eliminate 2,100 jobs, and to transfer another 1,000 jobs to lower-cost centres. As part of the reductions, Nortel shut down its Calgary campus in 2009.


title: Nortel

text: During its reporting of third quarter 2008 results, Nortel announced it would restructure into three vertically-integrated business units: Enterprise, Carrier Networks, and Metro Ethernet Networks. As part of the decentralization of its organization, four executive positions were eliminated, effective January 1, 2009: Chief Marketing Officer - Lauren Flaherty; Chief Technology Officer - John Roese; Global Services President - Dietmar Wendt; and Executive Vice President Global Sales - Bill Nelson. A net reduction of 1,300 jobs was also announced. As its stock price dropped below $1, the New York Stock Exchange notified Nortel that it would be delisted if its common shares failed to rise above $1 per share within 6 months. Rumours continued to persist of Nortel's poor financial health, amid the late 2000s recession, and its bids for government funds were turned down.


title: Nortel

text: On January 14, 2009, Nortel filed for protection from creditors, in the United States under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code, in Canada under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act, and in the United Kingdom under the Insolvency Act 1986. Nortel was the first major technology company to seek bankruptcy protection in this global downturn. Nortel had an interest payment of $107 million due the next day, approximately 4.6% of its cash reserves of approximately $2.3 billion. After the announcement, the share price fell more than 79% on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Export Development Canada agreed to provide up to C$30 million in short-term financing through its existing credit support facility with Nortel. The Canadian government resisted characterizing its position on Nortel as a bailout.


title: Nortel

text: Nortel initially hoped to re-emerge from bankruptcy, implementing a retention bonus plan in an effort to retain its top executives during the restructuring period. These bonuses, totaling US$45 million, were targeted at 1,000 executive positions. At the end of January 2009, Nortel announced that it would be discontinuing its WiMAX business and its agreement with Alvarion. Nortel subsequently sold its Layer 4–7 application delivery business to Israeli technology firm Radware for $18 million, after Radware had initially placed a stalking horse bid. Nortel had acquired the application switch product line in October 2000 when it purchased Alteon WebSystems.


title: Nortel

text: With the worsening recession and stock market decline deterring potential companies from bidding for Nortel's assets, and many of Nortel's major customers reconsidering their relationships with the restructuring company, in June Nortel announced that it no longer planned to emerge from bankruptcy protection, and would seek buyers for all of its business units. After announcing it planned to sell off all of its assets, Nortel shares were delisted from the Toronto Stock Exchange on June 26, 2009 at a price of $0.185 per share, down from its high in 2000 when it comprised a third of the S&P/TSX composite index. Mike Zafirovski subsequently resigned in August, and Nortel's board of directors was reorganized with three members instead of nine. Nortel handed out $14.2 million in cash compensation to seven executives in 2009. Nortel also paid out $1.4 million to 10 former and current directors, and paid $140 million to lawyers, pension, human resources and financial experts helping to oversee the company's bankruptcy proceedings.


title: Nortel

text: Nokia Siemens Networks made a stalking horse bid to purchase Nortel's CDMA and LTE assets for $650 million. By the July 21 deadline for additional bids, MatlinPatterson and Ericsson had made offers, and Ericsson emerged as the victor in the following auction, with a purchase price of $1.13 billion. Avaya won an auction for Nortel's Enterprise Solutions business, including Nortel's stake in Nortel Government Solutions and DiamondWare, for $900 million, after having placed a stalking horse bid of $475 million. In November, Nortel sold its MEN (Metro Ethernet Networks) unit to Ciena Corporation for US$530 million in cash and US$239 million in convertible notes,


title: Nortel

text: and its GSM business at auction to Ericsson and Kapsch for US$103 million. Hitachi purchased the Next Generation Packet Core assets. As insurance against judgments in class action lawsuits filed by former employees, John Roth filed in December 2009 for a US$1 billion indemnification from Nortel, joining the list of U.S. creditors.


title: Nortel

text: In February 2010, Ernst & Young, the court-appointed monitor of Nortel's Canadian bankruptcy proceedings, reported that the assets of Nortel's Health and Welfare Trust had a shortfall of $37 million in its net assets as of December 31, 2008. The trust supports pensioners' medical, dental and life insurance benefits, as well as income support for some groups such as long-term disability recipients. Also in February, Nortel negotiated a $57 million deal to wind up the health care and other benefits provided to former Canadian employees. Shortly afterwards, Nortel proposed spending $92.3M on retention bonuses for 1,475 employees in its Nortel Business Services and Corporate groups, with $2.5 million in incentives going to Christopher Ricaute, president of Nortel Business Services; $27 million allocated for Canadian employees; and $55 million allocated for U.S. employees. The proposed plan was later extended by an additional $27 million. Claiming that the retention bonuses proposal was extraordinary, acting US trustee Roberta DeAngelis objected to the payment of $55.6 million to 866 employees. However, court-appointed representatives for Nortel's former employees, who are creditors in the Ontario bankruptcy court, have signed an agreement to not oppose any employee incentive program.


title: Nortel

text: GENBAND purchased the Carrier VoIP and Application Solutions (CVAS) unit in May 2010, as Nortel accepted its stalking horse bid of $282 million, with adjustments that decreased the net sale price to about $100 million, without a formal bidding process. Ericsson purchased Nortel's share in its joint venture with LG Electronics for US$242 million, forming LG-Ericsson, in June 2010. Ericsson also purchased Nortel's final operating unit, the Multi-Service Switch division, in September 2010 for US$65 million. Nortel's Ottawa campus on Carling Avenue was purchased by Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) in October 2010 for a cash purchase price of CDN$208 million, to serve as the new home of Canada's National Defence Headquarters.


title: Nortel

text: Nortel's 53.13% stake in Turkish company Nortel Netaş was acquired by One Equity Partners (OEP) and Rhea Investments for $68 million in December 2010.


title: Nortel

text: The last major asset of Nortel, approximately 6,000 patents and patent applications encompassing technologies such as wireless, wireless 4G, data networking, optical, voice, Internet, and semiconductors, was sold for $4.5 billion to a consortium including Apple, EMC, Ericsson, Microsoft, BlackBerry Limited, and Sony, pending American and Canadian court approval. (Google had placed the initial stalking horse bid of $900 million and later upped the bid to $1,902,160,540, then $2,614,972,128, and eventually $3.14159 billion, which are references to Brun's constant, Meissel–Mertens constant, and pi.) Bankruptcy filings state that Nortel owed former Canadian engineers $285,000 for patent awards that were not paid.


title: Nortel

text: In October 2011, the administrators of Nortel's British subsidiary lost their appeal to overturn a court order requiring them to pay £2.1 billion into Nortel's underfunded pension plan. Nortel's U.S. retirement income plan is now managed by PBGC Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation.


title: Nortel

text: In January 2014, a pact between the U.S. and European divisions of Nortel was approved by a U.S. court. However, litigation continued. In April 2016, Nortel went back to court for a fresh round of legal arguments in a seven-year-old bankruptcy which cost creditors about $2 billion including attorney fees. Courts in the U.S. and Canada approved a negotiated settlement among competing creditors in January 2017.


title: Nortel

text: Nortel made telecommunications, computer network equipment and software. It served both general businesses and communications carriers (landline telephone, mobile phone, and cable TV carriers). Technologies included telephonic (voice) equipment, fiber optics, local wireless, and multimedia.


title: Nortel

text: In 2016, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported that lawyers and accountants received billion from Nortel's estate.


title: Nortel

text: After bankruptcy, Nortel's estate faced million in claims to pay for environmental damage at various sites, including Belleville, Brockville, Kingston and London.


title: Nortel

text: In September 1991, Julian Assange was discovered in the act of hacking into the Melbourne master terminal of Nortel.


title: Nortel

text: In 2012, "The Wall Street Journal" reported that in 2004, Nortel discovered that crackers gained almost-complete access to Nortel's systems. Beginning in at least 2000 they accessed documents including emails, technical papers, research, development reports, and business plans. The breach was not properly addressed by the time the company filed for bankruptcy in 2009. Hackers working from Chinese IP addresses had allegedly used seven passwords of Nortel executives, including a former CEO, to penetrate networks owned by the company.


title: Nortel

text: Brian Shields, a former senior systems security advisor for Nortel, led an internal investigation into the breach and exposed rootkit software on at least two machines in 2009 that allowed hackers to control them remotely and monitor email. Despite the original discovery in 2004 and the subsequent investigation that led to the rootkit detection in 2009, Nortel allegedly ignored the problem and failed to disclose it to potential buyers of its business. Avaya and Genband both acquired parts of Nortel, and some employees used old Nortel machines connected to the new companies' networks. Although Avaya says it has dealt with the issue, Shields says "it's despicable that Nortel didn't say anything", leaving it up to him to inform the new company of his investigation. Nortel refused to comment on The Wall Street Journal report, but former CEO Mike Zafirovski, in charge between 2005 and 2009, claimed the company "did not believe it was a real issue".


title: Nortel

text: Shields alleged that the hacking may have benefited Chinese competitors such as Huawei and ZTE. While unable to offer conclusive proof Shields stated that "When 2000 came along, then it was a downward slide. And that coincidentally is the year when Huawei started selling on the international market. How coincidental."


title: Nortel

text: On February 16, 2003, the Winnipeg Sun published an article criticising the Canadian Federal government for propping up "mega-loser Nortel" through Export Development Canada (EDC). The article interviewed Walter Robinson of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation who termed this EDC support as "corporate welfare at its worst.". Mr Robinson was appalled that Canadians who already lost billions on Nortel on the stock market would be asked for even more money through their taxes to support Nortel.


title: Nortel

text: The EDC had agreed to provide up to million in short-term financing through an existing bonding facility. This money was previously available to Nortel, and no special funding was made available. The Canadian government resisted characterizing its position on Nortel as a bailout.


title: Nortel

text: There have been reports of financial irregularities at Nortel's Health and Welfare Trust. Diane Urquhart, a financial analyst, testified before a parliamentary committee that $100 million is missing from the HWT and that a $37 million loan to the corporation has not been paid back. The HWT was an unregistered trust maintained by Nortel to provide medical, dental, life insurance, long-term disability and survivor income and pension transition benefits.


title: Nortel

text: Until 2005 Nortel fully funded the disability insurance in its HWT. However, it is alleged that since then, the HWT Governance Committees and third party trustee, Northern Trust, breached their fiduciary duties to protect Nortel's disabled employees and survivors of deceased employees by allowing Nortel to misdirect over million from the HWT for purposes inconsistent with the terms of the HWT.


title: Nortel

text: As of March 1, 2012, Northern Trust continues to act as the paying agent for Canadian Nortel pensioners.


title: Nortel

text: In 2007, both the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Ontario Securities Commission laid charges against former senior financial officials from Nortel including Frank Dunn who was fired from Nortel in 2004. Frank Dunn was promoted from chief financial officer to replace John A. Roth as CEO in November 2001. According to the SEC, Dunn and three other financial officers began to fudge revenue by misusing "bill and hold" transactions starting "no later than September, 2000". The SEC said that at least a year's worth of the alleged book-keeping took place while John Roth was still CEO of Nortel, even though no charges were laid against him.


title: Nortel

text: On June 23, 2010, the News and Observer published a story criticizing treatment pensioners have been receiving from their former employer, Nortel. According to the article, Nortel has asked a federal court to terminate medical coverage, prescription drug coverage, long-term disability, and life insurance of 4,000 retirees and dependents, claiming the benefits are costing the company $2 million per month. Nortel blamed the company's creditors for this decision.


title: Nortel

text: In the middle of the decade several class-action lawsuits were filed against John Roth and others, by former employees who felt that their 401K company plans were depleted due to misrepresentation by the defendants. They claimed they were duped into investing in Nortel stock, when those who encouraged them to do so allegedly knew that the company was ailing. John Roth left Nortel in 2001 with more than million.


title: Nortel

text: In 2009, Roth filed a claim for billion, aiming to become a creditor to the assets of Nortel along with all other Nortel employees, in case the class action lawsuits against him succeeded.


title: Nortel

text: During Nortel's 2002 annual shareholders' meeting held in Halifax, Nova Scotia, several shareholders (including Robert Verdun) complained about non-arms-length relationships with service providers such as director Yves Fortier, who provided legal services to Nortel while sitting on its board, and Nortel's auditors, Deloitte & Touche LLP, who were paid $15 million for non-auditing services.


title: Nortel

text: In 2013 workers preparing the former Nortel headquarters for the Department of National Defence discovered electronic eavesdropping devices. The bugs found were older and non-operational leading Canadian intelligence to draw the conclusion that the former tenant Nortel and not the future tenant MND was the target.


title: Nortel

text: In 2001 Nortel identified knockoff products circulating in the Chinese market, in which they did not compete. Nortel management chose not to press the issue.


title: Nortel

text: During Nortel's dissolution the headquarters was relocated to 5945 Airport Road in Mississauga, Ontario. Previous locations of its head offices included 60 Moodie Drive in Ottawa (now headquarters of Department of National Defence), 8200 Dixie Road in Brampton, Ontario (sold to Rogers Communications in 2006 and now known as Rogers Park, Brampton) and 195 The West Mall in Toronto (now used by SNC-Lavalin).


title: Nortel

text: Nortel expanded into the U.S. in 1971. The company eventually had employees in over 100 locations in the U.S. with R&D, software engineering, and sales centres in many states including California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Texas, and Virginia. Nortel's full-service R&D centres were located in Ottawa (its R&D headquarters), Beijing, and Guangzhou. In Canada, Nortel also had R&D sites in Montreal, Belleville, and Calgary. In the United States, Nortel's major R&D sites were in Research Triangle Park (North Carolina), Richardson (Texas), Billerica (Massachusetts), and Santa Clara.


title: Nortel

text: Nortel had a significant presence in Europe, Middle East, Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Nortel delivered network infrastructure and communication services to customers across Asia in (mainland) China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, India, Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, and Turkey (Nortel owned 53.17% of Nortel Netaş, originally established as a joint venture with Turkish PTT in 1967).


title: Nortel

text: In addition, the company had three joint ventures in the People's Republic of China, including Guangdong Nortel Telecommunications Equipment (GDNT), which operated Nortel's full service R&D centres in China.


title: Nortel

text: At the start of 2010, based on membership in Nortel's benefit plan, there were 1,637 employees working for Nortel Networks and 982 working for Nortel Technology in Canada.


title: Nortel

text: In February 2008, Nortel employed approximately 32,550 people worldwide, including 6,800 employees in Canada and 11,900 in the United States. Nortel operations were divided into the following segments:


title: Nortel

text: Nortel's board of directors resigned and the board disbanded effective October 3, 2012. All remaining executive officers also resigned effective this date. As part of the wind-down process, a court order was issued providing Ernst & Young Inc., the court-appointed monitor in Nortel's creditor protection proceedings, the ability to exercise any powers which may be properly exercised by a board of directors of Nortel.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The Philadelphia Story is a 1940 American romantic comedy film directed by George Cukor, starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, James Stewart, and Ruth Hussey. Based on the 1939 Broadway play of the same name by Philip Barry, the film is about a socialite whose wedding plans are complicated by the simultaneous arrival of her ex-husband and a tabloid magazine journalist. The socialite character of the play—performed by Hepburn in the film—was inspired by Helen Hope Montgomery Scott (1904–1995), a Philadelphia socialite known for her hijinks, who married a friend of playwright Barry.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Written for the screen by Donald Ogden Stewart and an uncredited Waldo Salt, it is considered one of the best examples of a comedy of remarriage, a genre popular in the 1930s and 1940s in which a couple divorce, flirt with outsiders, and then remarry—a useful story-telling device at a time when the depiction of extramarital affairs was blocked by the Production Code.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film was Hepburn's first big hit following several flops, which had placed her on a 1938 list of actors considered to be "box office poison" compiled by Manhattan movie theater owner Harry Brandt. Hepburn acquired the film rights to the play, which she had also starred in, with the help of Howard Hughes in order to control it as a vehicle for her screen comeback. According to a Turner Broadcasting documentary "MGM: When the Lion Roars", after Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer purchased the film rights, they were skeptical about Hepburn's box office appeal, so MGM studio head Louis B. Mayer took an unusual precaution by engaging two A-list male stars (Grant and Stewart) to support Hepburn.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Nominated for six Academy Awards, the film won two: James Stewart for Best Actor, and Donald Ogden Stewart for Best Adapted Screenplay. MGM remade the film in 1956 as a musical, retitled "High Society", starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, and Frank Sinatra.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: "The Philadelphia Story" was produced by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry in 1995.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Tracy Lord is the elder daughter of a wealthy Philadelphia Main Line socialite family. She was married to C.K. Dexter Haven, a yacht designer and member of her social set, but divorced him two years prior, because, according to her father, he does not measure up to the standards she sets for all her friends and family: He drank too much for her taste, and, according to him, as she became critical of him, he drank more. Their only interaction while married, the film's opening scene, is her breaking his golf clubs and him pushing her to the ground. Now, she is about to marry "nouveau riche" "man of the people" George Kittredge.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: In New York, "Spy" magazine publisher Sidney Kidd is eager to cover the wedding, and assigns reporter Macaulay "Mike" Connor and photographer Liz Imbrie. Kidd intends to use the assistance of Dexter, who has been working for "Spy" in South America. Dexter tells Kidd that he will introduce them as friends of Tracy's brother Junius (a U.S. diplomat in Argentina). Tracy is not fooled, but Dexter tells her that Kidd has threatened the reputation of her family with an innuendo-laden article about her father's affair with a dancer. Tracy deeply resents her father's infidelity, which has prompted her parents to live separately. Nonetheless, to protect her family's reputation, she agrees to let Mike and Liz stay and cover her wedding.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Dexter is welcomed back with open arms by Tracy's mother Margaret and teenage sister Dinah, much to Tracy's frustration. She soon discovers that Mike has admirable qualities, and even seeks out his book of short stories in the public library. As the wedding nears, she finds herself torn between her fiancé George, Dexter, and Mike.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The night before the wedding, Tracy gets drunk for only the second time in her life, kisses Mike, and ultimately takes an innocent midnight swim with him. When George observes Mike carrying an intoxicated Tracy into the house afterward, he assumes the worst. The next day, he tells her that he was shocked and feels entitled to an explanation before going ahead with the wedding. Yet, she admits she really has none, and realizes that he does not really know her at all. He has loved her as a perfect, ideal angel, an embodiment of goodness—a virginal statue—and not as a person, so she breaks off the engagement. By now she better understands her own imperfections and her criticism of others. Tracy realizes that all the guests have arrived and are waiting for the ceremony to begin. Mike quickly volunteers to marry her, but she graciously declines because she perceives that Liz is in love with him. Then, Dexter, who clearly planned to win her back all along, offers to remarry her, and she gladly accepts.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Broadway playwright Barry wrote the play specifically for Hepburn, who ended up backing the play, and forgoing a salary in return for a percentage of its profits. Her co-stars were Joseph Cotten as Dexter Haven, Van Heflin as Mike Connor, and Shirley Booth as Liz Imbrie.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The original play, starring Hepburn, ran for 417 performances. It made over $1 million in box office sales and later went on to tour, performing another 250 times and making over $750,000 in sales. The play also originally featured another character named Sandy. However that role was eliminated for the movie to make more room for the character development of Mike.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: At this time, Hepburn hoped to create a film vehicle for herself which would erase the label of "box office poison" that she had acquired after a number of commercial failures (including the classic "Bringing Up Baby"). So, she happily accepted the film rights to the play from Howard Hughes, who had bought them for her. She then convinced MGM's Mayer to buy them from her for only $250,000, in return for Hepburn having veto over producer, director, screenwriter, and cast.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Hepburn selected director George Cukor, in whose films "A Bill of Divorcement" (1932) and "Little Women" (1933) she had acted, and Donald Ogden Stewart, a friend of Barry's and a specialist at adapting plays to the big screen, as writer.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Hepburn wanted Clark Gable to play Dexter Haven and Spencer Tracy to play Mike Connor, but both had other commitments. Grant agreed to play the part on condition that he be given top billing, and that his salary would be $137,000, which he donated to the British War Relief Society. The pairing of Cukor and Gable would have been problematic in any case, as they had not gotten along on the recent "Gone with the Wind", and Cukor had been replaced with Victor Fleming, who was a friend of Gable's.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film was in production from July 5 to August 14, 1940 at MGM's studios in Culver City. It was shot in six weeks and came in five days under schedule. At one point, Stewart slipped in his hiccuping during the drunk scene. Grant turned to him, surprised, and said, "Excuse me", then appears to have stifled a laugh. The scene was kept, and was not reshot.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Stewart had been extremely nervous about the scene in which Connor recites poetry to Tracy, and believed that he would perform badly. Noël Coward was visiting the set that day, and was asked by Cukor to say something to encourage him. Stewart was also quite uncomfortable with some of the dialogue, especially in the swimming pool scene.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film premiered in New York City on December 26, 1940, and it was shown in select theaters in December, but MGM had agreed to hold its general release until January 1941 in order to not compete with the stage play, which was no longer playing on Broadway, but was touring the country. It went into general American release on January 17, 1941. It broke a box office record at Radio City Music Hall by taking in $600,000 in just six weeks.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The model sailboat that Grant gives Hepburn is based on an actual boat, the "True Love" (originally the "Venona II", based on the Malabar design by John Alden built for racing), which currently sails on Seneca Lake out of Watkins Glen, New York, as an excursion boat for Schooner Excursions, Inc.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: According to MGM records, the film earned $2,374,000 in the US and Canada, and $885,000 elsewhere, resulting in a profit of $1,272,000.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: Writing for "The New York Times" in 1940, Bosley Crowther wrote that the film "has just about everything that a blue-chip comedy should have—a witty, romantic script derived by Donald Ogden Stewart out of Philip Barry's successful play; the flavor of high-society elegance, in which the patrons invariably luxuriate; and a splendid cast of performers headed by Hepburn, Stewart, and Grant. If it doesn't play out this year and well along into next, they should turn the Music Hall into a shooting gallery ... Metro and Director George Cukor have graciously made it apparent, in the words of a character, that one of 'the prettiest sights in this pretty world is the privileged classes enjoying their privileges'. And so, in this instance, will you, too." Seventy-five years later, Peter Bradshaw wrote "However stagily preposterous, George Cukor's 1940 movie "The Philadelphia Story", now rereleased, is also utterly beguiling, funny and romantic. ... The fun and wit rise like champagne bubbles, but there is a deceptive strength in the writing and performances." Bradshaw also notes that the film is the "most famous example of the intriguing and now defunct prewar genre of 'comedy of remarriage.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film has a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 101 reviews, with an average rating of 9/10. The consensus reads: "Offering a wonderfully witty script, spotless direction from George Cukor, and typically excellent lead performances, "The Philadelphia Story" is an unqualified classic." The site also ranked it as the Best Romantic Comedy of all time.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film was the last of four starring Grant and Hepburn, following "Sylvia Scarlett" (1935), "Bringing Up Baby" (1938), and "Holiday" (1938).


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, winning two (Best Actor and Best Screenplay). At the 1940 ceremony, James Stewart did not expect to win and was not planning to attend the ceremony, but he was called and "advised" to show up in a dinner jacket. He said he had voted for Henry Fonda for his performance in "The Grapes of Wrath", and always felt the award had been given to him as compensation for not winning for his portrayal of Jefferson Smith in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" the previous year. Donald Ogden Stewart, on the other hand, declared upon winning "his" Oscar: "I have no one to thank but myself!"


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: In 1995, the film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress, and was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The stars of the film appeared in a one-hour radio adaptation on the premiere episode of the War Office's special "Victory Theater" summer series, airing July 20, 1942. This episode was specially produced by "Lux Radio Theatre" volunteer personnel as their donation to the "Victory Theater" series, and it aired under government, not Lux, sponsorship. "Lux Radio Theatre" produced a second adaptation for its own use on June 14, 1943, with Robert Taylor, Loretta Young, and Robert Young. The film was also adapted for two half-hour episodes of "The Screen Guild Theater", first with Greer Garson, Henry Fonda, and Fred MacMurray (April 5, 1942), then with Hepburn, Grant, and Stewart reprising their film roles (March 17, 1947).


title: The Philadelphia Story (film)

text: The film was adapted in 1956 as the MGM musical "High Society", starring Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Celeste Holm, and Louis Armstrong, directed by Charles Walters.


title: Slag

text: Slag is a by-product of smelting (pyrometallurgical) ores and used metals. Broadly, it can be classified as ferrous (by-products of processing iron and steel), ferroalloy (by-product of ferroalloy production) or non-ferrous/base metals (by-products of recovering non-ferrous materials like copper, nickel, zinc and phosphorus). Within these general categories, slags can be further categorized by their precursor and processing conditions (e.g., Blast furnace (BF) slags, air-cooled blast furnace (ACBF) slag, basic oxygen furnace (BOF) slag, and electric arc furnace (EAF) slag) .


title: Slag

text: Due to the large demand for these materials, slag production has also significantly increased throughout the years despite recycling (most notably in the iron and steelmaking industries) and upcycling efforts. The World Steel Association (WSA) estimates that 600 kg of by-products (~90 wt% is slags) are generated per tonne of steel produced.


title: Slag

text: Slag is usually a mixture of metal oxides and silicon dioxide. However, slags can contain metal sulfides and elemental metals.


title: Slag

text: The major components of these slags include the oxides of calcium, magnesium, silicon, iron, and aluminium, with lesser amounts of manganese, phosphorus, and others depending on the specifics of the raw materials used. Furthermore, slag can be classified based on the abundance of iron among other major components.


title: Slag

text: In nature, iron, copper, lead, nickel, and other metals are found in impure states called ores, often oxidized and mixed in with silicates of other metals. During smelting, when the ore is exposed to high temperatures, these impurities are separated from the molten metal and can be removed. Slag is the collection of compounds that are removed. In many smelting processes, oxides are introduced to control the slag chemistry, assisting in the removal of impurities and protecting the furnace refractory lining from excessive wear. In this case, the slag is termed "synthetic". A good example is steelmaking slag: quicklime (CaO) and magnesite (MgCO) are introduced for refractory protection, neutralizing the alumina and silica separated from the metal, and assisting in the removal of sulfur and phosphorus from the steel.


title: Slag

text: As a co-product of steelmaking, slag is typically produced either through the blast furnace - oxygen converter route or the electric arc furnace - ladle furnace route. To flux the silica produced during steelmaking, limestone and/or dolomite are added, as well as other types of slag conditioners such as calcium aluminate or fluorspar.


title: Slag

text: There are three types of slag: ferrous, ferroalloy, non-ferrous slags, which are produced through different smelting processes.


title: Slag

text: Ferrous slags are produced in different stages of the iron and steelmaking processes resulting in varying physiochemical properties. Additionally, the rate of cooling of the slag material affects its degree of crystallinity further diversifying its range of properties. For example, slow cooled BF slags (or air-cooled slags) tend have more crystalline phases than quenched BF slags (ground granulated blast furnace slags) making it denser and better suited as an aggregate. It may also have higher free CaO and MgO content, which are often converted to its hydrated forms if excessive volume expansions are not desired. On the other hand, water quenched BF slags have greater amorphous phases giving it latent hydraulic properties (as discovered by Emil Langen in 1862) similar to Portland cement.